Technical Writing Required of Graduate Engineering Students

Gregory K. West University of Florida ; Patricia Byrd University of Florida

Abstract

Technical writing required of employees in business and industry has been investigated, but the writing demands on graduate students have not been systematically surveyed. To find out what kinds of writing are required of graduate engineering students, twenty-five engineering faculty members from the Engineering College at the University of Florida listed the kinds of writing assigned to graduate classes during the academic year 1979–80. Since the faculty members were asked to rank-order the writing kinds from most frequent to least frequent, the Friedman analysis of variance and the Wilcoxon Signed Ranks test were used to test for differences in the rank ordering. The tests showed that faculty assigned examinations, quantitative problems, and reports most frequently, that they assigned homework and papers (term and publication) less frequently, and that they assigned progress reports and proposals least frequently.

Journal
Journal of Technical Writing and Communication
Published
1982-01-01
DOI
10.2190/3m0f-eucv-7j2d-6njm
CompPile
Open Access
Closed
Topics
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Citation Context

Cited by in this index (3)

  1. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication
  2. Journal of Technical Writing and Communication
  3. Written Communication

References (12)

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