Technical communication skills are highly valued in the engineering[1] and practicing engineers spend a large portion of work time writing or speaking. However, feedback from industry indicates a lack of communication skills in many engineering graduates[2]. Engineering curriculums therefore need to improve how communication skills are taught. The movement towards more effective teaching of communication skills to engineers has resulted in opportunity for collaboration with communication experts. One issue is that technical writing, and its products, are often viewed as outside of engineering practice, e.g. something to be done once the 'real' engineering work is complete. However, through research using sociocultural and situated learning frameworks, an understanding is emerging that engineering communication and engineering identity are linked and technical communication skills cannot be separated from the context of engineering practice[1]. There is therefore a need for engineering and communication disciplines to come together for mutual learning. In this paper, we describe an innovative "Writing in Engineering Faculty Fellows" program that occurred at Montana State University, an R1 land grant institution in the Northern Rockies that does not have an official Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) program. The goals of the Faculty Fellows program are to provide a space for mutual multidisciplinary learning and to work towards changing the culture of teaching writing and communication in engineering. Specifically, the goal is to help engineering faculty integrate more effective writing experiences into undergraduate engineering courses, and for engineering faculty to be able to share what they have learned from their experience with others in their college. The Fellows consisted of six faculty; two from chemical engineering, two from environmental engineering, one from mechanical engineering and one technical writing faculty; as well as the Writing Center director. Over the course of an academic year, the Fellows met monthly for discussion and reflection, with readings and reflection prompts guiding the discussion. The Fellows focused on these main guiding questions: What is "good communication" in engineering? What kinds of writing experiences do students need to facilitate their development as "good communicators"? What resources do faculty need to create those experiences? From these initial discussions, we propose that engineering communication instruction requires not only changing our coursework to embed writing practice across the curriculum, but also situating writing for our students as part of engineering work. As the program progresses over the next few years, the Fellows will advise and join in the research and assessment of current writing in engineering programs and become ambassadors for integrating writing into engineering by promoting programs, recruiting new faculty, and leading workshops for engineering faculty members. Ultimately, the outcome of the program will be an instructional toolkit for engineering and technical communication faculty, including exercises, assignment outlines and assessment tools, that aids in situating communication within engineering practice. The purpose of this work-in-progress paper is to describe the structure and process of this multidisciplinary Faculty Fellows program, to narrate the mutual learning that occurred in the first year of the program and discuss future efforts to evaluate the impact of the program on how engineering faculty teach communication. 1. Paretti, M.C., L.D. McNair, and J.A. Leydens, Engineering Communication, in Cambridge Handbook of Engineering Education Research, A. Johri and B.M. Olds, Editors. 2014, Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. p. 601-632. 2. Donnell, J., A. , et al., Why Industry Says That Engineering Graduates Have Poor Communication Skills: What the Literature Says. ASEE Conferences: Vancouver, BC. 3. Williams, J.M., Transformations in Technical Communication Pedagogy: Engineering, Writing, and the ABET Engineering Criteria 2000. Technical Communication Quarterly, 2001. 10(2): p. 149-167.
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