Title: Lecturer
Department: College of Engineering
College/School: College of Engineering
Showcase Course: ENGR 401
Email: huijeff@hawaii.edu
“My mission is to help students be more prepared for the workforce with real life skills and experience. Our education system does not do enough to prepare students for traditional office jobs, where the vast majority of our students will spend their entire careers.”
Table of Contents
Teaching Philosophy
My mission is to help students be more prepared for the workforce with real life skills and experience. Our education system does not do enough to prepare students for traditional office jobs, where the vast majority of our students will spend their entire careers. I know this because I come from 20 years of industry experience at McKinsey, Facebook, and Instagram. I managed new grads and interns for over 10 years, where I was routinely recognized as a top people manager and talent developer. I found a lot of my time was spent teaching entry level employees how to write emails, conduct meetings, synthesize information, and other basic skills. I started ENGR 401 in 2022 with the goal of giving students real life experience while teaching them the basic work skills they need to succeed.
Real world workforce development
Teaching Practice
BACKGROUND ON THE COURSE:
I want to first give background on the course, so reviewers understand what the students go through. I design the course and select projects as I would manage an internship in a corporate setting. Students form teams and are assigned roles (e.g., project manager, business manager, or subject matter expert). Groups are paired with a sponsoring organization, which might be a local small business, government agency, or DoD entity. The sponsor presents a problem that they want solved. Problems are always new, and never reused, and the problems are always real world issues that the sponsor is actively looking to solve.
The final deliverables from the students are:
(1) ~50 customer interviews with synthesized learnings.
(2) A prototype of a solution to solve the problem and addresses pain points identified during customer interviews.
(3) Final presentation of their findings and their work.
Along the way, students give weekly presentations and receive feedback from me, their sponsor, and peers.
TEACHING PRACTICE:
In regards to teaching, I utilize a 4 layer approach to this course.
The foundational layer is the lean startup methodology, which is a common framework for startups in Silicon Valley. Lean startup teaches students how to deeply understand what a customer needs or wants and how to create impactful solutions that address their needs. It also emphasizes quickly iterating and getting real world feedback on your solution vs spending a lot of time studying and creating. While this framework is traditionally applied to tech companies, it also teaches students critical thinking and problem solving skills, which are essential to any job.
The second layer is skill building. I found the lean startup was a great framework, but it was insufficient at teaching the necessary professional skills. Moreover, I polled students, and they were very interested in more professional skill development. Therefore the second layer of my approach is a heavy dose of real world skill building – email writing, weekly presentations, field research, and project management. We do skill building workshops in class and I provide templates as learning tools.
The third layer is live, real world projects. Using real problems from local organizations is crucial to challenge the students to apply their learnings from ‘layer 1’ and ‘layer 2’. Without a real problem, the learning lacks the nuance and sufficient challenges for the students to deeply learn.
The final layer is real time feedback. We review emails, recordings of meetings, and project management plans as a group so the students can learn from each other. Students give a live presentation every week, so they can give each other feedback and learn from what others are doing. I provide live feedback as well. After class, students are expected to meet with their sponsoring organization for further feedback. All of this feedback must be addressed in the following week’s presentation. There are no quizzes or homework. Students present updates and get feedback as they would in the real world.
In summary: I start with the lean startup methodology as the foundational approach to problem solving → I then layer on skill building so the students have a step by step guide on how to do the work → They apply their learnings to a real world problem, so the learnings are fully utilized and engrained in their professional toolbox → We finish with real time feedback, which is the best way to learn and improve. This is my unique approach, based on 20 years of leading teams, coaching interns, and mentoring young professionals.
(I will provide sample templates and materials in attachments)
APPLICABILITY:
My approach can be applied anywhere and to any field that has real world problems. Each semester I apply the same methodology to a broad spectrum of subjects, that have ranged from mobile app development to mental health. My methodology aims to teach students to solve problems independently, to be critical thinkers, and clear communicators – these are universal career skills. The only difficult approach is that this is very time consuming for the instructor. To make this truly “real”, I find 3 brand new, real world projects every semester. Sourcing sponsors and projects takes as much time as teaching the course, but this is what makes it impactful for the students. I never want to give theoretical case studies, I want students to work on REAL projects and gain REAL experience. My approach is also time consuming, because I have to do my own research on each project, so I can give insightful feedback each week.
Impact
I separate impact into: Student Outcomes vs Broader Impact.
STUDENT OUTCOMES are assessed solely on feedback, which follows standard corporate feedback structure:
1/ 100% of students receive peer reviews from 3-5 teammates. This is meant to replicate 360 peer reviews.
2/ Students receive weekly verbal feedback from sponsoring organizations for 13 weeks. This is meant to replicate an executive review.
3/ I provide 14 sets of written comments and 2 full written assessments (at the midway point and semester end) for each student. This is meant to replicate interactions with a direct manager.
BROADER IMPACT: The most important measures of success happen AFTER my course.
1/ Company impact: 10 projects were continued by the sponsoring organization after the course ended. This means the sponsor saw enough value in the work to either hire the students or shift their internal teams to take over the work.
2/ Job placement: I am most proud to say 21 of my students received internships or jobs DIRECTLY from class projects or relationships from class.
3/ My course also received many intangible accolades:
– 5 media writeups (e.g., KHON, HPR)
– 5 student presentations to highest level leaders (e.g., Lt. Gov Luke, Commanding General of 25th Infantry Division)
– 1 team won UH venture competition (first place prize of $10K)
– 2 teams received private grants of $5K and $10K
– 2 teams were invited to travel to Philippines and Molokai to work on projects