Relating Senior Project Time on Task to Student Scores

It is the hypothesis of these investigators that time on task should be proportional to the achieved score in senior project. However, due to the large number of different projects in the past, it was not feasible to clearly assess whether time on task would equate to score achieved. For the first time this year, the engineering capstone course will have a significant number of students engaged in a similar project. This presents a unique opportunity to obtain meaningful data on whether the above hypothesis can be proven true. The hypothesis will be applied to two projects with nine students and eight students respectively. The metric used to measure the time on task will be the Project Status Report (PSR) in which the students self-report their time and tasks. Each student's weekly time on task will be compared to that week's assignment scores. At the end of the quarter, the total time on task will be compared to their quarter grade. Anecdotal data would indicate that more time on task yields better scores. Historical data on recurring projects will be reviewed to see if it provides any additional information. As the data is collected, it is expected to show a threshold score exists where more time on task does not necessarily yield a better score. The monitoring of student time on task by instructors could potentially allow for a more rapid and focused feedback to students at risk. The data is expected to produce a sigmoidal curve with a lower threshold to indicate at risk students. Conversely, there would be an upper threshold beyond which additional time does not necessarily lead to better scores.