Ryder Jaeger

Course: Introduction to Engineering, ENGR-100
Professor: Jane Jones
Assignment Title: Artificial Intelligence in the Education of Software Engineers

Assignment Details

My project was about the possibility of implementing artificial intelligence in the education of software engineers. The main question I wanted to answer was, “How can the new advancements in artificial intelligence be used to assist software engineers in the education?” I explored this by researching multiple methods that could be implemented in the classroom including AI assisted tutoring programs, AI assisting teachers in grading and evaluating work, and AI flipped classroom settings.

Application

My topic connects to my field of study as I am going to school to become an electrical engineer and my topic is about how artificial intelligence could be used to transform the education of engineers for the better. My topic explores techniques being tested right now that could possibly be used in my own education further down the line.

Results/Conclusions

There is a clear need for software engineers; however, not enough software engineers are graduating to fill these positions. This is due to issues in education that force students to either change their major or leave their pursuit of education all together. To combat this issue, AI has been proposed to assist education of software engineers in three major ways: AI assisted tutoring programs, AI assisting teachers in grading and evaluating work, and an AI flipped classroom setting. All three of these methods have proven to be successful in their own respect and have potential to help improve the education process for software engineers leading to more graduating software engineers joining the workforce. Because of this, it would be best to find a way to implement all these solutions in some form to give software engineers the widest array of options for improving their education. Simply restated, I found that there are positions available for software engineers that need to be filled and implementing AI in education is one way to get more engineers into the field by making education better for everyone involved.

Challenges and Successes

One challenge that came up for me whilst working on my project was finding studies with results I could use for my paper inside the U.S. To solve this issue, I was able to take studies from outside the U.S. and relate them to other sources to communicate my information more effectively and show proven results from these artificial intelligence programs. This process of searching for studies also led to me finding different types of AI implementation in education from standard tutoring programs to AI assisted courses in something called a flipped classroom.