{"id":9476,"date":"2011-11-29T12:08:58","date_gmt":"2011-11-29T16:08:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/?p=9476"},"modified":"2011-11-30T14:40:51","modified_gmt":"2011-11-30T18:40:51","slug":"wright-state-educators-honored-by-ohio-magazine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/2011\/11\/29\/wright-state-educators-honored-by-ohio-magazine\/","title":{"rendered":"Wright State educators honored by Ohio Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Nathan Klingbeil, along with colleagues Kuldip Rattan, Michael Raymer, David Reynolds and Richard Mercer, has helped redesign the university\u2019s engineering mathematics curriculum to increase retention and graduation, a model that is spreading across the country.<\/p><\/div>\n

An engineering professor who is helping boost the graduation rate, an expert in Athletic Training who has also developed programs for the Latino community and two other Wright State University educators are among college officials around the state honored by Ohio Magazine<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Nathan Klingbeil, Ph.D., professor and associate dean for academic affairs in the College of Engineering and Computer Science; Tony Ortiz, M.Ed., director of Athletic Training Education Program (ATEP) and Latino community liaison; Lisa Kenyon, Ed.D., associate professor of biological sciences and teacher education; and William Slattery, Ph.D., professor of earth and environmental sciences and teacher education, are Excellence in Education Honorees recognized in the magazine\u2019s December issue.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was really caught off guard,\u201d Ortiz said. \u201cI was shocked because there are a lot of other good people deserving of this award on this campus.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ortiz heads the Latino Dream Team, a proactive group of area Latino organizations whose mission is to preserve the culture of Latinos and assimilate them into the fabric of the community. The group has taken the lead in addressing education, health care, economic and quality-of-life issues relating to the Latino community.<\/p>\n

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Tony Ortiz heads the Latino Dream Team, a proactive group of area Latino organizations whose mission is to preserve the culture of Latinos and assimilate them into the fabric of the community.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cWe started some programs that are starting to be sustainable on their own,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Klingbeil, along with colleagues Kuldip Rattan, Michael Raymer, David Reynolds and Richard Mercer, has helped redesign the university\u2019s engineering mathematics curriculum to increase retention and graduation, a model that is spreading across the country.<\/p>\n

Kenyon called the magazine\u2019s recognition a special honor. Her research focuses on engaging K-12 students and teachers in scientific practices such as explanation, argumentation and scientific modeling.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want students to learn how to reason scientifically, not just memorizing a body of facts,\u201d Kenyon said. \u201cPreservice teachers are our future science teachers, and I think it is important for them to have all the necessary knowledge, skills and excitement about teaching science.”<\/p>\n

Said Slattery, \u201cIn my 17 years at Wright State, I\u2019ve tried to build the public\u2019s knowledge of earth science, provide undergraduate student teachers with the understanding they need to help future students succeed, and provide the tools for K-12 classroom educators to build their students\u2019 knowledge and understanding of STEM science.\u201d<\/p>\n

Klingbeil said the sequencing of calculus courses at Wright State and other universities was making it difficult and discouraging for incoming engineering students, causing many to drop out.<\/p>\n

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Lisa Kenyon, Ed.D., associate professor of biological sciences and teacher education.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cWhat we’ve tried to fix is the inaccessibility of the traditional engineering curriculum,\u201d said Klingbeil. \u201cIf we can graduate more good engineers and computer scientists, the country can certainly use them.\u201d<\/p>\n

So with the help of several grants from the National Science Foundation, Klingbeil and colleagues developed EGR 101, a first-year engineering course that introduced all the math topics students would encounter and how the topics would apply to the engineering courses. And sequencing was changed so that students could take calculus courses later in their college careers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve de-coupled student advancement in engineering from student success in calculus,\u201d Klingbeil said. \u201cAll of the calculus is still required, but students now take it at their own pace. It is no longer freshman calculus that determines if you can be an engineer.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Photo<\/a>

William Slattery, Ph.D., professor of earth and environmental sciences and teacher education.<\/p><\/div>\n

Wright State has graduated about 25 more engineers in each of the past two years than the university did six years ago. And aspects of the curriculum change are currently being piloted by more than 15 collaborating institutions in strategic locations across the country, including Ohio, Texas, Oklahoma, California, Michigan, Washington and Virginia.<\/p>\n

The approach has been titled \u201cA National Model for Engineering Mathematics Education.\u201d And Rattan and Klingbeil have just authored a new textbook titled Introductory Mathematics for Engineering Applications, <\/em>published by John Wiley & Sons in August 2011.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re trying to use that book as a way to effect nationwide curriculum change,\u201d Klingbeil said. \u201cIf we can get a key number of institutions in regional locations, then maybe we can get entire states to start tipping. Once that starts happening, that\u2019s when you can effect nationwide change.\u201d<\/p>\n

In addition to the curriculum change, Klingbeil and his staff have revamped the advising process so that all first-year engineering students are assigned to advisers in the engineering college. And they have also instituted peer-mentoring and tutoring programs for all incoming students.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we certainly don\u2019t want to do is just water down the entryway,” Klingbeil said. \u201cThe idea is to give our students all the tools they need to be successful, provide them with overwhelming support, and offer them the highest caliber instruction available in an engineering classroom.\u00a0 The rest is up to them — and we believe most are up to the challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Wright State engineering professor who is helping boost the graduation rate and… Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":9488,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[722,724,743,711,336,725,715,719],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-awards","category-engineering-computer-science","category-faculty-staff","category-features","category-home-news-sidebar","category-news","category-special-categories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9476"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9476\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9558,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9476\/revisions\/9558"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}