Paper ID #32546

Exploring the Role of Project-based Learning in Building Self-efficacyin First-year African Engineering Students

Dr. Heather R. Beem, Ashesi University

Dr. Heather Beem is a Mechanical Engineering Faculty at Ashesi University in Ghana, where she leads theResourceful Engineering Lab. Her research explores the mechanisms and manifestations of resourcefuldesign, particularly along the lines of indigenous innovation, experiential education, and bio-inspired fluiddynamics. Dr. Beem completed her Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at MIT/WHOI, and moved shortlythereafter to Ghana. She founded and leads Practical Education Network (PEN), a STEM education non-profit equipping Ghanaian STEM teachers to employ experiential pedagogies, leveraging locally-availableresources.

c©American Society for Engineering Education, 2021

Exploring the role of project-based learning in building

self-efficacy in first year African engineering students

Abstract

Many students entering university in Africa have spent the bulk of their school hours learning

through rote memorization, which can lead to low academic performance and self-efficacy. A

locally-relevant, project-based learning experience was provided to all first year engineering

students (N = 91) at Ashesi University in Ghana. Pre and post surveys were administered to

understand changes in students’ self-efficacy as a result of the intervention. The project scope

was to design, build, and fly a quadcopter drone to simulate surveying a mining area in

Zimbabwe and transporting items between two sites. This scope was significantly more

challenging than anything most of them had done before, as evidenced by less than half of the

students reporting prior experience designing and building any product, and nearly a third

describing the project as “impossible” at first. Significant (p < 1.04 E-2) increases with medium

to large effect sizes (|g| = 0.653 to 1.427) were measured for five of six self-efficacy measures,

capturing how students’ belief in their own abilities increased as a result of the intervention. The

effect size of the increase was largest for those students with no prior experience in fabrication.

The intervention had no to small effect size on students’ aspirations for how they will use

engineering, suggesting that stronger connections should be made to the broader implications of

the skills they are acquiring. Some of the top challenges expressed by students shifted from

inward-facing ones (such as negative self-perceptions and doubts in their own abilities) to those

commonly experienced in group projects (such as teamwork and troubleshooting), providing

another indication of increase in self-efficacy. Despite the level of complexity of the project, the

top emotions expressed by students upon completion of the project were pride and joy. The use

of responsive pedagogy should be further refined in the African context, mechanisms for

building self-efficacy in young African engineers should be elicited, and they should be

considered equally alongside interventions focused on improving learning outcomes.

Introduction

Most countries that have achieved sustainable development have done so through a concerted

focus on technology and innovation. Existence of an innovation-driven economy depends

directly on the quality of education available for the rising generation. Although the West

African nation of Ghana recently achieved lower-middle income status [1], its potential for

sustainable development continues to be limited by its educational system’s ability to produce

independent and productive workers. Rote memorization dominates pedagogical practice across

most of the nation.

The results of the pervasiveness of rote pedagogies are far-reaching. Directly, students

disengage, learn less effectively, and lose interest in STEM careers. Engaging Ghanaian students

in hands-on activities can, however, significantly counter these negative effects [2,3]. By

extension, rote memorization results in minimal technological innovation that Ghanaians can

point to with pride as a local output. This falsely perpetuates the negative global narrative around

what capabilities young Africans possess. The concept of stereotype threat has been used to

understand how students who are viewed poorly because of their identity can experience reduced

academic performance [4-6]. This has largely been studied with African-Americans, however,

since African students are subject to this negative global perception, the concept should be

extended to understand their experience as well. Achieving sustainable development will require

an infusion of responsive pedagogies that meet the contextual realities, build students’ interest

and confidence in their identity as African engineers, and equip them with solid technical skills.

Self-efficacy is defined by Bandura [7] as “people’s beliefs about their capabilities to produce

designated levels of performance that exercise influence over events that affect their lives”. The

author identifies four sources of self-efficacy: (1) mastery experiences, (2) vicarious experiences,

(3) social/verbal persuasion, and (4) reduction of negative somatic and emotional states. Methods

for improving personal beliefs in African engineering students’ efficacy should be uncovered. In

this study, the first of those four potential sources of self-efficacy was chosen as the focus.

One way to implement a “mastery experience” in engineering coursework is through the use of

Project Based Learning (PjBL). This approach engages students in a specific “real-world”

problem, and it is based on the constructivist idea that students gain deeper understanding when

they personally construct their learning [8]. Many engineering programs have implemented this

approach, and they have observed that the process of going from idea to prototype is highly

motivating, especially for first year students, and it can improve their retention in the discipline

[9-11]. It is also seen to increase the students’ sense of belonging in the engineering department

[12]. Both men and women first year engineering students have been seen to find PjBL a method

that makes learning fun and purposeful [13]. It may even hold disproportionality greater benefits

for minority students, as [14] showed that PjBL in a final-year engineering course increased

domain-specific self-efficacy in Hispanics students more than the gains achieved by the non-

Hispanic students. Culturally-responsive pedagogy, as defined by [15], was drawn on in the

crafting of this student project. This approach makes curricula relevant to students’ lived

experiences, revising approaches to meet students’ interests and needs in local, situated contexts.

This approach has been shown to improve further education prospects [16], develop identities

and increase participation in STEM fields such as computing [17].

This study was designed around a semester-long project for first year engineering students at

Ashesi University. The project was presented to the students on their first day of class and

university. Given the recent growth of the local drone industry in Ghana, the author’s

conversations with students at the university eliciting their keen interest in the aerospace

discipline, and the goal of presenting a challenging project, the following scenario was

presented: A famous mining company in Zimbabwe needs to survey and take daily inventory of

mining assets, as well as move some of their asbestos samples between the two sites for analysis.

There are no roads linking the new mine to the old one, so moving by air is the most viable

option. You must design, build, and fly a quadcopter drone to carry out these tasks.

By presenting students a challenging project to gain substantial experience in, and situating it in

the African context, this study seeks to explore the following research question: How does

locally-relevant PjBL affect the self-efficacy and perceptions of first year African engineering

students who’ve had minimal prior fabrication experience and are subject to stereotype threat?

Methods

The project was introduced on the first day of Introduction to Engineering (in September 2019),

a required course for all engineering students in their first semester at Ashesi University. All

course topics were linked to the project. As technical content (Kinematics, Materials,

Aerodynamics, etc.) and skills (use of SolidWorks, Arduino, tools in the machine shop, etc.)

were introduced in class, the teaching team guided the students as to how those topics and skills

would support the design and fabrication of their drone. Fourteen project teams were created by

the teaching team with a selection of 5-7 students each, and with an even distribution of gender

and nationalities. The last three weeks of the eleven-week course were dedicated to project work

during class hours. The teaching team provided extra support outside of those hours as well. The

students were divided into two cohorts for the entirety of the course. This is not expected to have

any effect on the results shown here since the same content and experience was provided to both

groups equally. The data is analyzed and presented in aggregate for both cohorts.

Images of the students engaging in their project work are shown in Figure 1.

FIGURE 1. Drone fabrication underway in the (left) lab and (right) machine shop

The measurement tool used in this study was delivered as a survey form for all students (N = 91)

to fill out during the first week of the semester and directly after finishing the project. The tool

contained four categories of questions: 1- basic demographics, 2- prior level of experience, 3-

self-efficacy levels, and 4- perceptions of engineering and the project. The first category only

appeared on the pre-survey, but the others appeared on both the pre-survey and post-survey.

Basic demographics

The gender, major, and country of origin were asked through a pre-set list of choices, in order to

ascertain the general background of the students.

Prior level of experience

Students’ existing experience with relevant workshop, lab, and computer-based tools was

captured through a pre-set checklist. Their existing experience with designing and building

products was elicited through an open-ended response space to describe any of their previous

work.

Self-efficacy levels

Six dimensions of students’ self-efficacy were measured through one question each. Five

questions were asked on a Likert scale (1 to 10): “How confident are you to design your own

product?”, “How confident are you to build your own product?”, “How confident are you right

now to use the tools in the XX workshop?”, “How creative do you feel that you are?”, “How

comfortable are you to work on an open-ended problem?”. The remaining question “How many

days do you estimate it will take you to design and build a functioning drone from scratch?” had

pre-set ranges (1-5, 6-10, 11-15, 16-20, 21-25, 26-30).

Perceptions of engineering and the project

In the final category, three open-ended questions/prompts were provided “Which part of

engineering are you most interested in? What are your personal aspirations?”, “What do you see

as the challenges you will face in engineering?”, and “Describe your personal experience

working on the drone project.” This was intended to ascertain their feelings going through this

new experience, determine any shift in their personal interests/aspirations, and determine any

shift in their perceptions of the field of engineering as a result of the experience.

Using Excel, the data was cleaned and then disaggregated in two directions: along gender lines

and then based on whether they had previous design-build experience or not. All open-ended

responses were coded, which was done by first reviewing all responses, identifying common

themes/topics that appeared, and then creating categories for them. The responses were grouped

together in the most relevant category (or “Other” if none were deemed relevant) and then

ranked in order of most frequent appearance. All Likert scale questions were analyzed using a

paired, two-tailed t-test to determine statistical significance of any change between the pre-test

and post-test. A 5% threshold value was used. Only students whose responses appeared in both

tools were considered for this portion of the analysis. In order to determine the effect size of any

change, a Hedge’s g test was used. The effect size is considered small if |g|>=0.2, medium if

|g|>=0.5, and large if |g|>=0.8. These Likert-scale based questions were analyzed as a whole and

then also across the disaggregated lines.

Results

Basic demographics

All 91 students completed the pre-survey, from which it was seen that 39% are female and 61%

are male. 76% come from Ghana and the remaining 24% come from 7 other African countries.

The distribution across the university’s three majors is: 32% Computer Engineering, 44%

Electrical Engineering, 23% Mechanical Engineering.

Prior level of experience

Less than half of the students (46%) reported having designed and built anything prior to the

course. The others (54%) stated never having done so before. The categories of their responses

are shown in ranked order in Table 1. Note that some students wrote multiple items down, and

all of their responses have been counted. The top category that emerged was “simple

circuit/electronic device”, with 10% of all respondents stating their prior creation of an LED

circuit, fire alarm, or similar device. A few students (7%) had built a robot/robotic device. Ashesi

University provides a summer camp for high school students to learn robotics, and 4% reported

the smart home they created at that event. The remaining items reported were more simple than

those, for example toys made as children and paper-based structures. In summary, less than 20%

of students reported building something that required any of the standard

lab/workshop/computer-based tools that they will largely rely on during their engineering

studies.

Item % of respondents (N=90)

simple circuit/electronic device 10%

simple robot (robotic arm, forklift, etc.) 7%

toys (cars, playhouse, etc.) 6%

smart home with motion, light and temperature sensors 4%

paper model (plane, house, etc.) 4%

wooden structure 4%

simple motorized device (fan, etc.) 4%

incubator 2%

solar water heater 1%

sustain pedal 1%

culvert prototype 1%

Legos 1%

TABLE 1. Types of products designed and built prior to the course

The specific tools that students reported having experience using both before and after the

intervention are shown in Table 2. These are grouped into three types: computer-based,

lab/workshop-based, and other. It can be seen that prior to the intervention about half of the

students had done programming and hammering. The rest of the tools had largely not been used

by the students before.

After the intervention, a majority of students reported using all of the tools that were explicitly

taught in the course of the intervention. While most students hadn’t used many of these tools

beforehand, the intervention did provide exposure and practice to them. Discrepancies between

the reported post-intervention values and the expected 100% could be indicative of a division of

labor within group members. If, for example, a Mechanical Engineering student chose to not get

too involved in the coding aspect of the project, it is possible that they might have not checked

“Programming” on the post-survey list.

Pre Post

N = 90 N = 82

Computer-Based Tools

Programming 47% 73%

Arduino 14% 76%

Computer-Aided Design (CAD) 7% 83%

Lab/Workshop-Based Tools

Hammering 51% 52%

Sawing 23% 51%

Cutting metal 13% 74%

Soldering 13% 84%

Drilling 10% 77%

Milling 2% 5%

Welding 2% 0%

Other Responses

Other Tools 11% 18%

None 10% 1%

TABLE 2. Types of tools used before and after the intervention

Self-efficacy levels

Table 3 shows the results of the statistical analysis of the change of the six measures of self-

efficacy before and after the intervention. The results are shown disaggregated across gender. A

significant change (p < 5.00 E-02) with large effect size (|g|>=0.8) was experienced for nearly all

measures. The intervention improved self-efficacy significantly, and the extent to which it did is

captured through the effect size.

The last measure (working on an open-ended problem) had a significant increase but with small

and medium effect sizes for women and men, respectively. The number of days the respondents

estimated they would need to design and build a functioning drone from scratch decreased

significantly (the average went from 21 to 13 days, overall), however the decrease for women

had only a medium effect size.

Women Men

Question/Topic p-value Hedge’s g

value

Effect

Size

p-value Hedge’s g

value

Effect

Size

Confidence to

design

1.93 E-06 1.427 Large 3.57 E-07 0.932 Large

Confidence to

build

1.38 E-04 1.020 Large 4.22 E-08 1.092 Large

Confidence to use

tools in the

workshop

2.99 E-03 0.789 Large 1.97 E-05 0.879 Large

Number of days

needed to build a

drone

1.04 E-02 -0.653 Medium 8.79 E-10 -1.271 Large

How creative they

are

7.11 E -05 1.040 Large 3.03 E-09 1.045 Large

How comfortable

they are to work

on an open-ended

problem

2.97 E-01 0.256 Small 5.41 E-03 0.463 Medium

TABLE 3. p-value and effect size of change in self-efficacy, disaggregated across gender

In Table 4, the result from one of the measures is shown again, but now disaggregated across

students’ previous design-build experience level. It is seen that students with no previous

experience increased in confidence to use the tools in the workshop with large effect size,

compared to a medium effect size for those who already had some level of previous design-build

experience. Do remember that “experience” here includes anything that appeared in Table 1,

whether it involved using a workshop or not. This result is in line with the result captured in [18],

where students in the previous year group taking this same course experienced a significant

increase in confidence after their very first session in the campus machine shop.

The other five measures are not detailed here since their effect sizes were consistent across these

two categories. For “How comfortable they are to work on an open-ended problem”, both groups

experienced a statistically significant increase with small effect size. For the remaining measures,

both groups experienced a statistically significant increase with large effect size.

No Previous Experience Previous Experience

Question/Topic p-value Hedge’s g

value

Effect

Size

p-value Hedge’s g

value

Effect

Size

Confidence to use

tools in the

workshop

3.82 E-05 0.947 Large 1.37 E-03 0.713 Medium

TABLE 4. p-value and effect size of change in self-efficacy, disaggregated across previous

experience level

Perceptions of engineering and the project

1- “Which part of engineering are you most interested in? What are your personal

aspirations?”

The top three coded responses in the post-survey were “solving real-world problems/improving

the quality of life (in Africa, their home country, and/or community)”, “building more projects”,

“furthering their engineering skills in general”. A comparison of the shift in student interest in

the first one had no effect size (p-value = 3.971 E-01, Hedge’s g value = 0.112) in aggregate,

indicating no significant change in their interest in using engineering to solve locally-relevant

problems as a result of this intervention. There was, however, a small effect size in the shift

experienced by those students who had no previous design-build experience, as seen in Table 5.

No Previous Experience Previous Experience

Question/Topic p-value Hedge’s g

value

Effect

Size

p-value Hedge’s g

value

Effect

Size

Solving real-world

problems/improving

the quality of life

(in Africa, their

home country,

and/or community)

3.720 E-

01

0.159 Small 7.674 E-

01

0.059 None

TABLE 5. p-value and effect size of change in personal aspirations, disaggregated across

previous experience level

2- “What do you see as the challenges you will face in engineering?”

The top seven coded responses to challenges that students expect to face in engineering are

shown in Table 6. The top three challenges were consistent in the pre- and post-survey, however

the following ones shifted. The latter shifted largely from fears/perceptions the students had

about themselves and their abilities to more of the external conditions that govern real

engineering project work (teamwork, troubleshooting, working under pressure, etc.).

Challenges they foresee in engineering (ranked)

Rank

Pre

(N=87)

Post

(N=78)

1

Acquiring the necessary technical

knowledge/understanding the

course content 26%

Time constraints/time

management 27%

2

Time constraints/time

management 22%

Acquiring the necessary technical

knowledge/understanding the

course content 19%

3

Access to resources (financial

and/or materials) 14%

Access to resources (financial

and/or materials) 17%

4

Using fabrication tools they are

unfamiliar with/lack of exposure 13%

Iterating through the

design/Troubleshooting 9%

5

Learning through theoretical

approaches/shifting to practical

approaches 8% Teamwork 8%

6 Being creative/innovative enough 7% Stress/working under pressure 6%

7 Fear of failure 7% Acting ethically 4%

TABLE 6. Top challenges students expect to face in engineering

3- “Describe your personal experience working on the drone project.”

Finally, the most frequent coded responses to the open-ended prompt for students to describe

their personal experience working throughout the project are shown in Table 7. These are

grouped into three categories: self-perception, emotion, and lessons. Nearly a third (28%) of the

students explicitly wrote that they thought the project was impossible when they first about it.

They felt they didn’t possess the requisite skills to engage in this type of project. However, the

next most frequent responses were that they felt immense pride and joy (15%), and they built

their confidence through this project (10%). Some students also mentioned specific lessons they

learned about how to persevere/be resilient (9%) and the importance of iteration (4%). Given the

wide range of coded responses, no single response was reported by a majority of the students.

The quotes in Table 7 and the pictures in Figure 2 give a sense of the culmination of the project,

resulting in a thrilling flight that all fourteen teams successfully completed.

Personal experiences working on the project

% of respondents

(N = 82)

Select Quotes

SELF-PERCEPTION

Thought it was impossible at

first

28% “At the beginning of the project, I

thought you were joking. In my mind it

was impossible... I tried to picture it and I

could not see myself making a drone that

could fly”

Built confidence 10% “I discovered skills I didn’t know I had.”

“We are certified engineers!”

EMOTION

Built pride/sense of

accomplishment

15% “It was so satisfactory to build something

with your own hands, and to see that

thing fly "

“I felt complete”

Derived joy/excitement 15% "that experience… seeing [the success

of] what your own hands had been

working on was exhilarating."

LESSONS

Learned to be resilient 9% “this project…taught me that mistakes

are keys to perfection” Learned to deal with failure 7%

Learned the value of iteration 4%

TABLE 7. Top experiences from the project as a whole

FIGURE 2. (Left) Final preparations before (right) flight testing

Discussion/Conclusion

A semester-long, locally-relevant, Project-Based Learning experience was implemented for all

first-year engineering students at Ashesi University. All fourteen teams successfully completed

the challenge, designing, building, and flying quadcopter drones. This was a very new

experience for them, since less than half of the class had designed and built anything prior to this

intervention. Even fewer had used any standard lab/workshop-based to make those products. It

was also more technically challenging than anything they had done before, as evidenced by

nearly a third of them stating they thought the project was impossible at the beginning.

Self-efficacy levels:

This PjBL activity acted as a “mastery experience”, which is one of the four sources of self-

efficacy in Bandura’s framework. In this study it did indeed cause an increase in self-efficacy for

the participants. As students gained practice using tools and building things with their hands,

they blossomed along multiple dimensions of belief in their abilities. Significantly, the students

with the least prior experience in fabrication were seen to experience the greatest increase in self-

efficacy. This is consistent with a study conducted with the previous years’ Introduction to

Engineering students at the same institution [18], and which showed that a 3-hour session in the

machine shop caused a statistically significant increase in student confidence. Having

experienced largely theoretical and rote learning prior to this course, it appears that these

students are craving hands-on experiences and they rapidly grow in self-efficacy once the

exposure comes.

Women and men experienced similar effects from the intervention. The one measure along

which their change differed was that of their confidence to work on open-ended problems. The

women increased with small effect size, whereas the men increased with medium effect size. The

women are perhaps responding more conservatively than their counterparts, recognizing the

complexity that such problems can entail beyond the scope of what they have directly

experienced through this intervention.

Perceptions of engineering and the project:

The intervention generally did not end up causing a significant increase in student interest in

using engineering to solve real-world problems/improving the quality of life in Africa/their home

country/community. This could be because specific links from the project to other potential

applications were not provided, making the extension of these technical skills to other locally-

relevant problems weak. There was, however, an increase in this response with small effect size

for those students who did not have any prior design-build experience. This category of student

generally experienced the largest shifts, and so for them it appears that this intervention was able

to somewhat open their minds beyond the immediate technical skills-building to longer term

views of what they can use engineering to effect around them.

Prior to the intervention, some of the top challenges students perceived in doing engineering

were related to negative perceptions and/or doubts in their own abilities. After the intervention,

most of those internal concerns became less prevalent, and were overtaken by common dynamics

that exist in successfully carrying out project work, i.e. teamwork, troubleshooting, etc. This

provides another indication that their self-efficacy has increased. It suggests that even a single

PjBL experience can be powerful enough to counter negative self-perceptions perpetuated by

false global narratives.

Future Work:

Students experienced an immense sense of accomplishment and excitement from successfully

creating a solution to the challenging problem posed at the beginning of the course. The level of

difficulty of the project likely aided the significant increase in self-efficacy experienced. The

open-ended responses, however, also revealed a large level of frustration experienced in the

course of conducting certain steps of the work, indicating that such projects should be more

strategically scaffolded for learning.

This study has demonstrated potential for this type of learning experience to greatly increase the

self-efficacy of the next generation of Africa’s engineers. Although most African students do not

find themselves in a minority group at African universities in the same way that African-

Americans at US universities do, the former are nonetheless subject to a persistent negative

messaging of their abilities in comparison with counterparts in other parts of the world. Much

education reform in and for developing nations focuses on improving exam scores, but more

focus should be drawn to addressing the deeper issues of identity. The global-level stereotype

threat experienced by students is as important to address as their learning outcomes, and the two

likely feed into each other. Hands-on, project-based learning experiences have great promise

towards this end. Future research should continue to elicit mechanisms that enable students to

exercise agency to carve out or re-make their identities as African engineers.

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