5652 Views (as of 05/2023)
  1. Daniel Burkey
  2. https://cbe.engr.uconn.edu/person/daniel-burkey/
  3. Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education and Diversity
  4. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  5. University of Connecticut
  1. Daniel Anastasio
  2. https://www.rose-hulman.edu/academics/faculty/anastasio-daniel-anastasi.html
  3. Assistant Professor
  4. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  5. Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
  1. Cheryl Bodnar
  2. https://engineering.rowan.edu/programs/exeed/people/faculty_pages/bodnar-cheryl.html
  3. Associate Professor
  4. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  5. Rowan University
  1. Matthew Cooper
  2. https://www.cbe.ncsu.edu/person/mecoope3/
  3. Associate Professor (Teaching)
  4. Presenter’s NSFRESOURCECENTERS
  5. North Carolina State University

Collaborative Research: Experiential Process Safety Training for Chemical Eng...

NSF Awards: 1711376, 1711644, 1711672, 1711866

2020 (see original presentation & discussion)

Undergraduate, Informal / multi-age

Industrial process safety incidents are unfortunately a common fixture in the news. In response to these incidents, universities are required by ABET to include process safety instruction as part of their chemical engineering (ChE) curriculum, specifically that programs must “include the engineering application of these basic sciences to the design, analysis, and control of chemical, physical, and/or biological processes, including the hazards associated with these processes”. Typical approaches to address this ABET process safety requirement in classrooms include education related to “prevention through design (PtD)” measures such as inherently safer design and proper use of personal protective equipment (PPE).

Unfortunately, PtD approaches don’t address human decision making, which has been found to be the root cause of many process safety incidents. Teaching and assessment of decision-making strategies has challenges in a typical classroom environment, where students tend to decide an action that sounds the “safest” is the correct choice. In other words, since students know they are taking a test on process safety decision making, they tend to state they will make the safest decision, leading to inauthentic student responses. Similarly, in-class discussions, tests, etc. do not capture factors such as time or money constraints, or coworkers’ influences that may alter decisions in the real world and reveal a different level of moral development and understanding.

In this work we describe “Contents Under Pressure”, a digital virtual environment we designed to more realistically situate students in an authentic scenario in which they must balance multiple constraints, including process safety decisions.

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Discussion from the 2020 STEM For All Video Showcase (29 posts)
  • Icon for: Daniel Burkey

    Daniel Burkey

    Lead Presenter
    Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education and Diversity
    May 4, 2020 | 01:37 p.m.

    Hi Everyone! Thank you for visiting the "Contents Under Pressure" video. We're currently nearing the end of our initial work on this project, which focused heavily on the development and deployment of the game you see in our video above. We're currently exploring our next steps to develop it further and expand its reach to other educational institutions and potentially to industrial partners. To date, we've deployed it to senior engineering students, and as such, our video focuses on walking through some elements of the interface and getting feedback from students that have had the opportunity to play. We are especially interested in thoughts and discussion on the use of game play to create authentic interactions promoting student learning, as well as extending the use of such simulations beyond the college environment. We're excited to share this with you, and for the potential positive impact on process safety education!

  • Icon for: Sarah Lee

    Sarah Lee

    Higher Ed Administrator
    May 5, 2020 | 02:19 p.m.

     Hi, I enjoyed your video! Do you have some publications about the project that I may review?

  • Icon for: Cheryl Bodnar

    Cheryl Bodnar

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 5, 2020 | 04:37 p.m.

    We are happy to hear that you liked our video.  Here are some publications that discuss our work in more detail that you may find interesting :

    • Bodnar, C.A., Dringenberg, E., Butler, B., Burkey, D., Anastasio, D., Cooper, M. (2020). Revealing the Decision-Making Processes of Chemical Engineering Students in Process Safety Contexts. Chemical Engineering Education. 54(1), 1-9.
    • Butler, B., Bodnar, C., Cooper, M., Burkey, D., Anastasio, D. (2019). Understanding the Moral Reasoning Process of Senior Chemical Engineering Students in Process Safety Contexts. Education for Chemical Engineers. 28, 1-12.
    • Anastasio, D., Butler, B., Burkey, D., Cooper, M., Bodnar, C.A. (2019). Collaborative Research: Experiential Process Safety Training for Chemical Engineers. ASEE 2019 Annual Conference and Exposition, June 16-19, 2019. Tampa, Florida.

    The two journal articles focus on our process safety instrument (similar to providing students with paper based scenarios) and the conference paper touches on the work we have done with the game.  Currently, we have additional publications under review that show interesting results of how the game compares to the process safety instrument that we would be happy to share with you at a later date once they are published.  Feel free to reach out to any of us if this interests you.

     
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    Sarah Lee
  • Icon for: Sarah Lee

    Sarah Lee

    Higher Ed Administrator
    May 5, 2020 | 04:54 p.m.

    Thank you so much! 

  • Icon for: Brett Jones

    Brett Jones

    Higher Ed Faculty
    May 5, 2020 | 04:16 p.m.

    I like the way the game presents real situations that students otherwise not might think about or might not realize how they would react to (feel about). When asked, it's easy to say that you would do the right thing (safety first!), but having to consider how decisions affect production, cost, and time really forces you to think about it. "Will I piss off my co-worker? Will the boss be mad that we didn't get it done in time?"

     
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    Asta Schram
  • Icon for: Cheryl Bodnar

    Cheryl Bodnar

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 5, 2020 | 04:39 p.m.

    These are really great points.  We have observed in our work results very similar to what you have mentioned in your post.  The great part about the game is that we are able to observe these shifts in behavior as students have to manage emotional attachments they form to other characters that you just don't see in a traditional scenario based exercise.

  • Icon for: Brett Jones

    Brett Jones

    Higher Ed Faculty
    May 5, 2020 | 04:42 p.m.

    That's great to hear that you're able to meet your learning objectives in this way. I was especially struck by the woman in the video who said that she picked up on the different personalities of the characters. You all must have put some time into thinking about that aspect of the game. Very clever! It could be a way to engage some students that might not otherwise be as interested.

  • Icon for: Sara Yeo

    Sara Yeo

    Facilitator
    Assistant Professor
    May 5, 2020 | 04:18 p.m.

    Thanks for sharing your video! I have a question about the diversity of the characters--what are some of the options that players have? Given the goal of narrative transportation (i.e., of the players into the position of someone making process safety decisions), I'm wondering about the diversity of characters that might allow players to see themselves as the decision-makers.

     
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    Michael I. Swart
  • Icon for: Cheryl Bodnar

    Cheryl Bodnar

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 5, 2020 | 04:43 p.m.

    It is wonderful to hear that you enjoyed our video.  We purposely created the game so that within the interface the participant appears as if they are sitting at their desk and the only personal item present is a picture of their adopted daughter. As such, regardless of the participant's background, they can feel as if they are making the decisions within the context of the game environment.

    We also tried to ensure a diverse cast of characters within the game itself providing opportunities for participants to gain exposure to a variety of individuals in their day to day interactions on the job.  

  • Icon for: Sara Yeo

    Sara Yeo

    Facilitator
    Assistant Professor
    May 7, 2020 | 02:18 p.m.

    Thanks, Cheryl!

  • Icon for: Nancy Shapiro

    Nancy Shapiro

    Facilitator
    Associate Vice Chancellor
    May 5, 2020 | 04:41 p.m.

    Really interesting challenge, here:  What is the best way to get students to take safety seriously?  I think the game format has great potential--both because students are familiar with this approach, and because it allows for a variety of outcomes, depending on individual decisions. I am curious about whether you did any testing/comparisons between the game scenarios and other scenarios, such as case studies or role plays? I can see this as a "first level" engagement on safety issues, but how would you move to a more sophisticated level?  Thanks for sharing a very interesting (and important) project!

  • Icon for: Cheryl Bodnar

    Cheryl Bodnar

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 5, 2020 | 04:51 p.m.

    Thanks for sharing your perspective.  We did actually do this testing to compare students responses in these two types of environments.  We currently have a publication under review that discusses how students moral reasoning to prompts provided within a scenario based instrument (Engineering Process Safety Reasoning Instrument) shift when they are exposed to similar types of decisions in the context of the game.

    The game is meant to provide an opportunity for discussion with students.  Our goal is not to tell students what type of decision is necessarily right or wrong, but rather to make them aware of the types of decisions they are making and associated impacts so they can bring this awareness with them when they transition to an industrial environment.

  • Icon for: Ivory Toldson

    Ivory Toldson

    Facilitator
    President
    May 5, 2020 | 08:57 p.m.

    Well done. This allows student to practice making difficult decisions regarding safety within a virtual world where they can learn from mistakes without negatively effecting the safety of workers. The need to think proactively and consider future considerations is also an important lesson as well. 

    What are your thoughts about extending the use of such simulations beyond the college environment? 

  • Icon for: Cheryl Bodnar

    Cheryl Bodnar

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 6, 2020 | 08:33 a.m.

    We are really hoping to be able to use this outside of the college environment.  We are currently working at securing potential industry partners that may be interested in testing the game out as a training tool but are open to other forms of dissemination as well.  If you have any suggestions we would gladly hear them.

     
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    Discussion is closed. Upvoting is no longer available

    Ivory Toldson
  • Icon for: Hannah Sevian

    Hannah Sevian

    Higher Ed Faculty
    May 8, 2020 | 09:38 a.m.

    Watching this from the perspective of a chemistry professor (whose first degree was in chemical engineering), I also see a lot of potential for the use of your game in teaching chemistry and biochemistry majors about process safety. I think about half of American Chemical Society membership is chemists in industry, and there are also many industries that hire biochemists as well as biologists -- such as the biomedical industry that is huge in Boston where my university is located. What the ACS requires for accreditation of chemistry departments includes laboratory safety and ethics. Both lab safety and ethics are relevant in process safety, as the example in your video with time, safety, perception, and productivity considerations highlights. I think using your process skills tool could be a wonderful way to give budding chemists and biochemists opportunities to practice and hone their chemistry knowledge and skills to evaluate situations, which will be critical for some of their future careers. I wonder if you have suggestions for lessons or activities that could be adapted for chemistry and biochemistry courses.

  • Icon for: Matthew Cooper

    Matthew Cooper

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor (Teaching)
    May 8, 2020 | 03:33 p.m.

    Thanks, and great question! We haven't specifically considered chemistry / biochemistry courses, but one of the most important things we've learned in this work is the measurable difference between ethics (i.e. what is the most morally-justified choice) and behavioral ethics (i.e. what people actually do when the "chips are down" and a decision needs to be made in a stressful environment). This difference is covered with wonderful nuance in the book "Blind Spots" by Bazerman and Tenbrunsel. Our impetus for developing the digital environment is that it's challenging to train/evaluate peoples' decision making through a behavioral ethics lens, particularly in the classroom since students know they're being evaluated on the ethics of their decisions during a classroom exercise and so err on the side of being ethical. However, by immersing them in the narrative arc contained in the virtual environment and providing incentives and disincentives for every decision (regardless of whether ethics are involved in the decisions or not), it seems students forget they're being evaluated and reveal their real decision making tendencies. With this in mind, a classroom exercise that allows some kind of "practice field" for students to try out decision making in a realistic environment would be ideal - this strategy is called preauthentication in the literature if you're interested in learning more.

  • Icon for: Hannah Sevian

    Hannah Sevian

    Higher Ed Faculty
    May 8, 2020 | 03:50 p.m.

    Thanks Matthew. This is fascinating. Thanks for the keywords, and I'm going to read up on it. In the meantime, I've started the safety training myself now (it's awesome that the title of your video in the presenter info in the upper right links directly to the training), and I'm already learning a lot. Even without a background (yet) in moral vs. behavioral ethics, I can see how valuable it must be to push student learning and thinking forward.

  • Icon for: Matthew Cooper

    Matthew Cooper

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor (Teaching)
    May 9, 2020 | 08:19 a.m.

    Glad you're enjoying it, Hannah! We've made Contents Under Pressure available during the STEM For All video showcase, but it will be unavailable afterwards. Thanks for giving it a try!

  • Icon for: Jessica Gale

    Jessica Gale

    Researcher
    May 8, 2020 | 10:25 a.m.

    Great video and such a creative experiential approach. I love that you featured students' voices, including both what they found effective about the game and some of the aspects were challenging for them. 

  • Icon for: Matthew Cooper

    Matthew Cooper

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor (Teaching)
    May 8, 2020 | 03:17 p.m.

    Thanks Jessica! I agree that it's important to pay attention to student perspectives when trying out a new teaching tool - students often provide valuable insight into challenges and benefits the instructors had never considered when developing the tool.

  • Icon for: Anant Kukreti

    Anant Kukreti

    Higher Ed Faculty
    May 9, 2020 | 06:30 a.m.

    Liked the video. Are ethical issues also modeled in the games designed?

  • Icon for: Daniel Burkey

    Daniel Burkey

    Lead Presenter
    Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education and Diversity
    May 9, 2020 | 01:22 p.m.

    Thanks Anant! While the game is designed specifically to model process safety decision making, there is often significant overlap between process safety decision making and ethical decision making. As the game expands and we continue development, we can anticipate expanding the types of decisions students or players have to make.

  • Icon for: Anant Kukreti

    Anant Kukreti

    Higher Ed Faculty
    May 9, 2020 | 01:49 p.m.

    Thank you for the reply.

  • Icon for: Robert Huie

    Robert Huie

    K-12 Teacher
    May 11, 2020 | 01:39 p.m.

     Very interesting video!!  I enjoyed the different scenarios and the input of real students on the usefulness of the simulation.  I was wondering, what feedback do the students get after running the simulations, is it automatic?  Or is it a jumping off platform for further discussions?

  • Icon for: Cheryl Bodnar

    Cheryl Bodnar

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 11, 2020 | 04:18 p.m.

    Thank you for your positive feedback Robert.  The students do get an automatic summary once they have completed the game with a conclusion to the story and their final points based on how they performed in each of the three areas (safety, reputation, and productivity).  However, we do encourage faculty involved with implementing the game to include discussion with their students after the game has been completed as there are many interesting points that can be raised which are helpful to the class as a whole.

  • Icon for: Anant Kukreti

    Anant Kukreti

    Higher Ed Faculty
    May 11, 2020 | 01:49 p.m.

    Hello Robert,

    Thank you for viewing our video and for the positive feedback.  If the class has selected an engineering design challenge which requires computer simulation to be conducted to investigate performance of a design, then a student team should automatically get results output from the simulator software.  Based on the performance results they can make changes in select parameters of their design and again run the simulation.  This way they can alliteratively optimize their design to solve the challenge.  I hope this answers your question.  All the best!

  • Icon for: Cheryl Bodnar

    Cheryl Bodnar

    Co-Presenter
    Associate Professor
    May 11, 2020 | 04:20 p.m.

    Anant, thank you for your post.  I think that you may have accidentally responded to Robert in the wrong location (it appears Robert may have also posted a question about your video).  I just wanted to let you know so that you could copy your response to your video discussion forum so that he would be aware of it.

  • Icon for: Michael I. Swart

    Michael I. Swart

    Researcher
    May 12, 2020 | 07:51 p.m.

    Neat project brining a range of experiences to the students.  Can you expound on some of the design and re-design process as the game has evolved? Share valuable lessons learned that stand out?  Thanks for sharing.

  • Icon for: Daniel Burkey

    Daniel Burkey

    Lead Presenter
    Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education and Diversity
    May 12, 2020 | 07:58 p.m.

    Hi Michael!

    Thanks for your comment. Probably some of the biggest changes to the game have been in the User Interface. We modeled the general concept of the changing meters off of several other game mechanisms we had seen in practice. In some initial versions of the game, the student's who played the game expressed confusion over how these worked. The same was true of some of the post-decision-point prompts we asked the students to reflect upon. These were all really valuable observations and we iterated on those design elements to make them more clear to the player as they were in-game, usually by conveying information in a more straightforward way. One of the other changes was the implementation of the ability for the game to email the save file. In the earliest stages, the save file was stored locally, meaning a student always had to access it from the same computer. The email integration meant students could store the save file in their email and thus play the game on multiple devices. We're still relatively early in the life and development, and with future funding and time, we'd obviously like to expand the storyline further and provide for login or cloud based saves.

  • Further posting is closed as the event has ended.