Comprehensive Assessment of a Project Based Learning Application in a Project Management Course

The focus of this study is to implement multiple assessment methods in order to comprehensively assess the impact of a Project Based Learning (PrBL) application in construction project management course. The assessment methods include various direct (objective) and indirect (subjective) evaluations methods. These methods included a pre and post questionnaire of student opinions, homework grades, in-class "clicker" quiz grades, overall project grades, embedded test question grades, a video lecture project, and short answer case study questions on exams from the Fall 2017 to Fall 2019 semesters. The data for this study was taken from the past six offerings of the same course, which was compared to a similar course in the same department. The analysis demonstrated that the students preferred both the use of an actual real-world project and the PrBL delivery method. The particular assessment methods that provided the most beneficial assessment were the embedded test questions and the case study section of the exam. The overall grade assessment method demonstrated an average of four percentage point increase in grades from previous offerings of the course and a similar course that does not include the PrBL pedagogy.