Contact Info

Biography

Personal Gender Pronoun: He/Him/His

Education:
Ph.D., Engineering Education, Virginia Tech
M.S., Education, Universidad Javeriana, Colombia
B.S., Electronic Engineering, Universidad Javeriana, Colombia

Impactful Research Areas:
Connectivity
    Infrastructure & Transportation
Education
    Disrupting Inequalities in Engineering
    Equipping Students for Success

Research Expertise:
Instructional Change; Faculty and Students Motivation; Doctoral Education

My research aims to understand from a systems perspective how academy influences faculty motivation to change, undergraduate students’ motivation to learn, and retention and persistence of doctoral students (with special attention to underrepresented minority (URM) students).

Research on Instructional change and faculty motivation: Engineering education as a field has sustained multiple efforts to change pedagogical approaches in engineering by increasingly embedding research on learning into teaching practices (i.e, Instructional change). With my research I try to understand better why these multiple efforts have yielded low to moderate success or sustainability. My research suggests that this low success is explained because effective instructional change requires a perspective that accounts for the complex nature of academia and its dynamic effect on faculty motivation to change.

Research on Doctoral education and students’ motivation: Underrepresented minorities are finishing the engineering doctorate in lesser rates than their majority peers. A big cause for attrition is that often PhD students’ efforts are not aligned with the best activities for their degree progress. The more time it passes with this misalignment, the harder to refocus and make timely degree progress, which in turn causes students to lose motivation and in some severe cases depart from the doctorate. With a team of researchers, we are aiming to understand how the academic system is impacting 1) the students motivation to engage in activities most likely aligned to a successful doctoral journey, and 2) the students’ motivation to persist. Our research suggests that creating a Rising Doctoral Institute (RDI) that supports URM students transition to the doctorate would have a strong positive impact on students’ persistence and graduation. We aim to influence systemic institutional change by creating a sustainable model for the RDI in 25 different institutions along the nation.

Honors and Awards:
Collaborative: The Rising Doctoral Institute; (NSF); PI; total grant amount $1’762.883

Building an Entrepreneurial Mindset (EM) Concept Map Toolbox for Course and Program Evaluation; (Kern Family Foundation); Co-PI; total grant amount $499.641. This project aims to develop a direct assessment for EM using concept maps and assessing student progression over different time periods.

Power Engineering Education for the Next-Generation Smart Grid Workforce; (NSF); Co-PI; total grant amount $300.000. This project aims to retool the Electrical and Computer Engineering curricula to create a pathway for students interested in careers working on Smart Grids Industry

Professional Memberships:
ASEE (American Society of Engineering Education)

Recent Publications:
Cruz, J.M., Adams S.G., Bravo F (2022). A Systems Dynamics Model to Instructional Change in Academia. Journal of Engineering Education (In Review) 

Cerquera, M., Hurtado J.A., Cruz, J.M., Project-Based Learning Electromagnetics Wave Transmission Course: A CDIO approach (2022), Ingenieria y Universidad, https://doi.org/10.11144/javeriana.iued26.aecw

Murzi, H. & Cruz, J.M. (2019). Measuring Disciplinary Perceptions of Engineering from a Cultural Lens: A Validation of an Instrument in a Research Technical University, Journal of Education and Culture Studies.  https://doi.org/10.22158/jecs.v4n1p19

Jones, B. D., Li, M., & Cruz, J.M. (2017). A Cross-Cultural Validation of the MUSIC® Model of Academic Motivation Inventory: Evidence from Chinese- and Spanish-Speaking University Students. International Journal of Educational Psychology, 6(1), 25-44. doi:10.17583/ijep.2017.2357