As with any study, this study has limitations that must be addressed. The primary limitation is the variety of types of engineers. The amount of time spent on different writing tasks is partially dictated by the type of engineering being performed. As noted by survey participant Laura Pigozzi, “duties vary widely within engineering disciplines, job descriptions, and companies. Chemical engineering is not equal to civil engineering is not equal to biomedical engineering” (personal email communication, November 4, 2015). Survey participant Robert Irish agreed and noted that “big companies have formal meeting-minutes structures with action items, but start-ups often are writing their notes on scraps of paper or on a tablet; yet both need to understand how to communicate action with responsibility” (personal email communication, October 16, 2015). This limitation was noted by only two of the participants, which could indicate that most instructors are not aware of the differences that the various types of
engineering employ or it could simply mean that the instructors did not take the time to send an email regarding their concerns.
Additionally, the question regarding how instructors perceive what writing professional engineers do (or series of questions) prompted a few concerns. Robert Irish had the biggest objection, noting that the questions “worried” him. He continued by explaining, “I have done a significant amount of training of writing teachers at various engineering schools across North America, and frankly, many of them are quite clueless about what engineers both read and write” (personal email communication, October 16, 2015). I noted his concern but also realized that his views were part of the reason for the research: to determine the gap between what instructors perceive and what engineers actually do. Because of the purpose of the study, I was not too concerned about this limitation. And Robert Irish acknowledged that as well: “Perhaps I’m missing the point, and you’re trying to assess perceptions of instructors vs. actual writing in the field. You might get more interesting answers to these questions if you asked engineers rather than writing teachers. But, perhaps you’re doing that too” (personal email communication October 16, 2015). Since I am comparing the results of my survey to the results of Cunningham and Stewart’s study, I don’t see the approach as a strong limitation. I do think, however, that it would be worth making that purpose of the questions a little clearer in future studies to avoid confusion and to avoid people from seeing the initial questions and not completing the survey for fear that the study will not be effective. Also I am not sure that happened, there were some participants who started the survey but failed to complete it, and it is possible that one reason is because of the initial questions regarding the instructors’ view of what writing engineers do in their careers.
3 INSTRUCTORS’ PERCEPTIONS OF READING AND WRITING REQUIREMENTS IN PROFESSIONAL ENGINEERING
Once the survey was distributed and data collected, I worked to compile the results. First I reviewed the demographics of the participants. This information allowed me to see an overview of the participants in the survey and to consider how well they matched the needs for the study. Fortunately, all participants had the experience teaching technical writing, technical
communication, or professional writing that I was looking for with this survey. The demographic information also provides details on the participants’ degree, rank, experience, and type of institution.
When I moved to the survey questions that were designed to help answer my research questions, I first worked to determine the instructors’ perceptions of what types of reading and writing engineers do in their professional careers and how much time they spend doing the different types of reading and writing. The data for this portion of the research study was conducted through quantitative survey questions using the Likert scale. This information was instrumental because it would tell me what the instructors think, information that I would use to compare to Cunningham and Stewart’s study of engineers and their responses regarding the types of reading and writing they are required to do in their professional careers.
In addition, I considered the assignments that instructors require in their technical writing, technical communication, and professional writing courses. I looked at the types of assignments, how they weigh those assignments when calculating the final course grade, and how the instructors evaluate the assignments. This information came from two different areas of research. Some of the data was part of the quantitative research questions, but I also collected sample syllabi, assignment prompts, and rubrics. The syllabi and assignment prompts were
analyzed to determine the importance instructors put on various types of writing in their
technical communication, professional writing, or technical writing classes. And the rubrics were used to analyze what criteria instructors use when evaluating student work, information that can be compared to the criteria that engineers use when evaluating their own and other professional engineers’ written work.
All the data that is reported in this chapter will be analyzed in the next chapter, where I determine what the results mean by comparing the information to Cunningham and Stewart’s research on engineers’ perceptions of the reading and writing requirements in their professional engineering jobs.