Vision
The ECRL is a nationally recognized center for rigorous engineering education and cognition research, capitalizing on disciplinary knowledge and platforms housed within a traditional engineering department. ECRL students and alumni are recognized as engineers who, in addition to being fully technically competent at the graduate level, are experts in human subjects research related to engineering cognition and learning.
Dr. Catherine G. P. Berdanier
Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering
Catherine G.P. Berdanier is an Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering and the Director of the online Masters of Science in Mechanical Engineering Program. Catherine earned her B.S. in Chemistry from The University of South Dakota, her M.S. in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering and Ph.D. in Engineering Education from Purdue University. Her research interests include graduate-level engineering education including doctoral student attrition and persistence; engineering writing; and engineering communication. Her research has been published in Journal of Engineering Education, International Journal of Engineering Education, IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, and many other journal and conference venues. She is the winner of an NSF CAREER grant studying master’s-level departure from the engineering doctorate, a 2025 PECASE awardee, and is the author of the text So, You Have to Write a Literature Review: A Guided Workbook for Engineers (IEEE/Wiley Press.)
Mission
The ECRL team leverages tools, methods, and techniques from social science, education, and engineering in innovative ways to better understand the ways that humans interact with, learn, and understand engineering and engineering artifacts.