STS0 4100: Professional Development II

(Tech Issues and Solutions)

Course Instructor: Dan Lyles, PhD
Office: JEC 5006
Phone: x6388 (During Office Hours)
Office Hours:
Tuesday 10:30 am – 12:00 pm
Friday 10:30 am – 12:00 pm
All Other Times By Appointment
**Got something specific you want to cover? Try Calendly Link**
e-mail: Lylesd2@rpi.edu

Course TA:
Razi Mahmood - mahmor@rpi.edu

Course Meetings:
Sec 01 (68795) – PITTS 5114 – TUE 8:00 am – 9:50 am
Sec 02 (68796) – SAGE 4112 - TUE 2:00 pm – 3:50 pm
Sec 09 (68805) – FOLSOM 107 - WED 2:00 pm – 3:50 pm
Sec 12 (68809) – PITTS 5114 - FRI 8:00 am – 9:50 am
Sec 13 (68810) – SAGE 4510 - FRI 2:00 pm – 3:50 pm

Course Description
This course focuses on increasing students’ knowledge concerning the impact of technical and
non-technical issues on the viability of engineering designs and solutions. The non-technical issues we
will consider include the cognitive and physical strengths and limitations of people in the chain spanning
from product/equipment designers/manufacturers to end users, as well as economic, environmental,
cultural, political, ethical, health and safety, and societal influences. During the course, we will read and
discuss articles and case studies in which the solution pursued did not have the desired effect or led to
disaster. Possible explanations include a failure to take into account the environmental, economic,
socio-cultural, and/or political issues associated with the technology’s ultimate usage. In addition, the
resulting impact of the disaster/event on society will be examined.

Student Learning Outcomes

 Students will improve their verbal and written communication skills through interactive
discussions, presentations, project work, and essays. They will effectively share analyses and
findings with diverse audiences while collaborating with peers to address complex engineering
challenges.

 Students will demonstrate their understanding of the global impact of engineering solutions by
critically evaluating real-world case studies. They will identify and assess the technical, ethical,
economic, environmental, political and socio-cultural factors involved, and propose viable
design improvements or alternatives.
Among others, this course responds to the following student outcomes identified by the ABET:
 An understanding of process and solutions that meet specified needs with consideration of
public health, safety, and welfare, as well as global, cultural, social, environmental, and
economic factors.
 An ability to recognize ethical and professional responsibilities in engineering situations and
make informed judgments, which must consider the impact of engineering solutions in global,
economic, environmental, and social contexts.
 An ability to communicate effectively with a range of audiences. Students will demonstrate
understanding of the material by actively participating in classroom discussions, completing
assignments and project work, participating in a group presentation, and writing and reviewing a
paper.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusivity:

Please familiarize yourself with RPI’s policy toward Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
(https://info.rpi.edu/diversity). The School of Engineering is committed to fostering a welcoming
environment where no students, faculty, or staff are excluded on the grounds of gender, race, ethnicity,
class, religion, sexuality, disability, or any other characteristic. Creating such an environment provides
the greatest foundation for individual achievement for all students, enabling everyone to reach their full
potential. It also prepares us to engage effectively with a diverse world in all its richness.
The free exchange of ideas, along with diversity of backgrounds, experiences, and views,
enriches the learning experience and strengthens our design teams. A diverse, inclusive, equitable, and
respectful team brings significant benefits to businesses, customers, and employees. Decades of real-
world experience and data have shown that such teams excel in innovation, recognize and prevent
exclusion, and attract and retain top talent.
All participants in this course are encouraged to recognize and embrace the diversity around
them and are expected to treat their classmates with respect. Disrespectful, harmful, offensive, bigoted,
or violent language or behavior will not be tolerated.

Academic Integrity
Student-teacher relationships are built on mutual respect and trust. Students must be able to trust
that their teachers have made responsible decisions about the structure and content of the course, and
that they are conscientiously making their best effort to help students learn. Teachers must be able to
trust that students do their work conscientiously and honestly, making their best effort to learn. Acts
that violate this mutual respect and trust undermine the educational process. The Rensselaer Handbook
of Students Rights and Responsibilities defines various forms of Academic Dishonesty and you should
make yourself familiar with these. In this class, all assignments that are turned in for a grade must
represent the student’s own work.

 Academic Fraud: The alteration of documentation relating to the grading process. For example,
changing exam solutions to negotiate for a higher grade or tampering with an instructor’s grade
book.
 Collaboration: Deliberately facilitating an act of academic dishonesty in any way or form. For
example, allowing another student to observe an exam paper or allowing another student to
“recycle” one’s old term paper or using one another’s work in a paper or lab report without
citing it as another’s work.
  Copying: Obtaining information pertaining to a graded exercise by deliberately observing the
paper of another student. For example, noting which alternative a neighboring student has
circled on a multiple-choice exam.
 Cribbing: Use or attempted use of prohibited materials, information, or study aids in an
academic exercise. For example, using an unauthorized formal sheet during an exam.
 Fabrication: Unauthorized falsification or invention of any information in an academic exercise.
For example, use of “bought” or “ready-made” term papers, or falsifying lab records or reports.
 Plagiarism: Representing the work or words of another as one’s own through the omission of
acknowledgment or reference. For example, using sentences verbatim from a published source
in a term paper without appropriate referencing, or presenting as one’s own the detailed
argument of a published source, or presenting as one’s own electronically or digitally enhanced
graphic representations from any form of media.
 Sabotage: Destruction of another student’s work. For example, destroying a model, lab
experiment, computer program, or term paper developed by another student.
 Substitution: Utilizing a proxy, or acting as a proxy, in any academic exercise. For example,
taking an exam for another student or having a homework assignment done by someone else.

More Detailed Notes can be found at : 2014 – 2016 Rensselaer Handbook of Student Rights and
Responsibilities

Acceptable and Unacceptable Use of AI

The use of generative AI tools (e.g. ChatGPT, Dall-e, Goblin.tools, etc.) is permitted in this
course for the following activities:
 Brainstorming and refining your ideas;
 Fine tuning your research questions;
 Finding information on your topic;
 Drafting an outline to organize your thoughts; and
 Checking grammar and style.

The use of generative AI tools is not permitted in this course for the following activities:
 Impersonating you in classroom contexts, such as by using the tool to compose poll
question answers or reading responses assigned to you or content that you put into a
Zoom chat.
 Completing group work that your group has assigned to you, unless it is mutually agreed
upon that you may utilize the tool.
 Writing a draft of a writing assignment.
 Writing entire sentences, paragraphs or papers to complete class assignments.

You are responsible for the information you submit based on an AI query (for instance, that it
does not violate intellectual property laws, or contain misinformation or unethical content). Your
use of AI tools must be properly documented and cited in order to stay within university policies
on academic honesty. Any assignment that is found to have used generative AI tools in
unauthorized ways will be considered the equal of having knowingly turned in plagiarized
assignments. When in doubt about permitted usage, please ask for clarification. If you are
worried about providing appropriate levels of citation, please avoid these tools in relation to this
course.
Due to the emergence and rapid change of these tools, your instructor reserves the right for oral
review for any assignment turned into this course. If substantial portions of assignment seem the
result of unpermitted use of AI, the instructor may assign no points for the assignment or require
the student to meet and orally discuss (e.g. not via text or email) their answer.

A Few Course Notes from your Instructor:

 This course is operating on the basis of good faith of both students and instructors – We will
proceed under the assumption that unless good cause is given we are all being fair, honest and
open about what is happening in our lives and with the course.
 Students who have failed this course historically tend to:
o Fail to come to class regularly
o Fail to turn in homework and class assignments in a timely fashion
o Fail to communicate with me when there are challenges in doing the above two things.
 DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES EMAIL ME ASSIGNMENTS UNLESS I HAVE EXPLICTLY
AND SPECIFICALLY ASKED YOU TO DO SUCH. I WILL NOT REVIEW ANY ASSIGNMENTS SENT TO
MY INBOX. TURN IN EVERYTHING IN THIS COURSE TO THE APPROPRATE SPOT IN LMS.
 Participation- This is a highly interactive class that requires active discussion and participation.
Students will come to class having read the assigned reading materials, and be prepared to
discuss the information. This is not a course where attendance is optional.

COURSE COMPONENTS AND GRADING

 Class Participation 20% (e.g. Submitting questions for class, asking those questions during your
session, engaging with the work, participating with your group project, coming to class)
 Writing Assignments:
• Reading Responses 20%
• Midpoint Assessment 13%
• Final Assessment 17%
 Group Project (30%)
• Part 1 – Developing your project
• Part 2 – Presenting your project (Feedback and presentation)
• Part 3 – Final Project (First Draft + Revisions)
• Group Project Review (Individually Submitted)

Course Materials:
 There is no required text for this course. The readings can be found through some light use of
google scholar and will be provided through LMS.
 Books featured in this course but not Required:
o Norman, D. (2013). The design of everyday things: Revised and expanded edition.
Constellation
o Perrow, C. (2011). Normal Accidents: Living with High Risk Technologies-Updated
Edition. Princeton university press
o Kotter, J. P. (2012). Leading change. Boston (Massachusetts: Harvard Business Review
Press.
o Wisnioski, M. H. (2012). Engineers for change: Competing visions of technology in 1960s
America. MIT Press.
Writing Assignments
a. Reading Responses (20% of course grade)
You will write a brief response to key questions on the assigned readings and submit the responses via
LMS. Reading responses are due on the course LMS before the class meeting. All weekly reading
responses are required; at the end of the semester, I may drop one or more papers that will count
towards your final grade. We will discuss the specifics of how many I’m likely to drop as we approach
the final weeks of the course.

Some sample questions that you should answer be able to answer about your weekly reading response,
AND be prepared to discuss in class are:
 What is the main argument? How do you evaluate the argument?
 What are the main sociotechnical (e.g., human factors, social, economic, cultural, political,
environmental, ethical) causes/explanations?
 Who has power in this situation? What is the engineer’s role in creating systems that people will
use to settle disputes?
 What is the main argument in this week’s reading? Explain using one example.
 How do you evaluate the argument? Is it convincing? Why/not? What are possible limitations of
the argument?
 How can you apply this week’s argument and/or concepts in your own research? Be as specific
as you can (provide examples of how the argument/concept helps you understand certain
aspects of your own research).
 Identify two questions/issues that you think deserve further discussion based on this week’s
readings.

b. Mid-point and Final Assessment (Midterm 13%, Final 17% - total 30% of course grade)
Assignment should be double-spaced, Times New Roman, 12 point-font with 1-inch margins on
all sides. Use headings as appropriate to guide the reader (the instructor). Any figures or tables included
do not count against the page requirement and should be explained thoroughly in the body of the
paper. Always cite your resources, parenthetically and in the reference page. While I do not have a
preferred citation style, you are not allowed to use MLA in this course. I recommend you use whatever
format is common in your discipline and note that in your heading. Please don’t forget your name and
page numbers. Due dates will be on each assignment and we will go over that assignment in class before
it is due.

c. Group Research Paper and Peer Review (30% of course grade):

Overview of Paper
 Students in collaboration with their peers will write a 6-8-page research paper.
 Select a Technological System and explain the interaction of different elements and
where interventions may be made. These intervention points may be an engineering
solution, technical issue, event, disaster, or success story. You will provide an in-depth
discussion of what led up to the event, the event itself, and what happened as a result of
the event.
 Conduct an extensive literature review to identify key information on your topic. Be sure
to include all relevant technical and non-technical (e.g., human factors, social, economic,
cultural, political, environmental, ethical) factors that led to the event.
 Your topic may be a topic discussed in class
  Students will receive peer and TA/Professor reviews on the paper and will perform a peer
review.
 Students will be graded on both the quality of their paper and the quality of the peer
reviews they write.

What should I do if I miss class?

Missing class happens, but what’s most important is what happens after you miss that class. When you
miss class instruction, you miss opportunities to ask questions, get immediate feedback and receive
reminders about the courses’ due dates. If it all possible, let me know you’re planning to miss class
before it happens in an Email so that there is a record of it. It is your responsibility to connect with a
peer about what you missed in class that day or make arrangements to come to office hours to discuss
what you missed that you have questions about. It is strongly recommended that you show up to office
hours having read the material ready to discuss any material that you have questions or comments
about. An email, days later, asking “What did I miss?” is not sufficient- you will need to show up or talk
to someone who was there that day.
 Course Outline
Over the course of the semester, we will cover topics that cover three broad areas. The areas can be
broken in to three topics:
1. Tools for Modern Problems
a. Systems Thinking; Normal Accidents; Technology as Legislation; Human
Design; Community Design; The Future of Engineering/The Engineer of the
Future
2. Practical Skills For Professional Life
a. Writing Techniques; Reading like an Expert; Ideas for Generating Ideas;
Observation in the Wild
3. Disasters, Errors and Engineering Choices
a. Bhopal, India; Three Mile Island; Deep Water Horizon; Challenger; Artificial
Intelligence and the Future of Work

Topic
Week 1 Introduction to the Course
Week 2 Technology Is/Creates Power item options
Week 3 Design of Everyday Things
Week 4 Methods, Observations and Design Application
Week 5 Change pt 1 – Initiating Change and Building Teams
Week 6 Change pt 2 – Help and Learning
Week 7 Normal Accidents pt 1
Week 8 Normal Accidents pt 2
Week 9 Human Scale and Human Design
Week 10 Systems and Their Logic
Week 11 The Bhopal Disaster
Week 12 Deep Water Horizon
Week 13 Artificial Intelligence, Automation and the Future of Work
Week 14 The Future of Engineering and the Engineer of the Future
 Course Schedule (By Section Date)
Sec 01/02 (Tues) Sec 09 (Wed) Sec 11/12 (Friday)

Week 1 Sept 10th Aug 28th Aug 30th

Week 2 Sep 17th Sept 4th Sept 6th
Week 3 Sept 24th Sept 11th Sept 13th
Week 4 Oct 1st Sept 18th Sept 20th
Week 5 Oct 8th Sept 25th Sept 27th
Week 6 Oct 15th Oct 2nd Oct 4th
Week 7 Oct 22nd Oct 9th Oct 11th
Week 8 Oct 29th Oct 16th Oct 18th
Week 9 Nov 5th Oct 23rd Oct 25th
Week 10 Nov 12th Oct 30th Nov 1st
Week 11 Nov 19th Nov 6th Nov 8th
Week 12 Nov 26th Nov 13th Nov 15th
Week 13 Dec 3rd Nov 20th Nov 22nd
Week 14 Dec 10th Dec 4th Dec 6th