Dr. Oprean will be Co-PI on two new exciting projects: Build it Green!: Enhancing Middle School Science Education through an Energy Efficient Building Design Curriculum; and Research on the Use of Real-Time Tracking and Eye-Tracking Technology for Integrating Metacognition and Augmented Reality into Undergraduate Engineering Laboratories.

NSF DRK-12 as a Co-PI with Laura Zangori (PI), Laura Cole (Co-PI), and Jong Bum Kim (Co-PI) for $2,950,334. Titled Build it Green!: Enhancing Middle School Science Education through an Energy Efficient Building Design Curriculum

This grants takes a previously funded curriculum for green building education created by Zangori and Cole to integrate web-based educational digital tools to create a storyline unit that adapts the curriculum for use in rural middle schools in Missouri. The curriculum is titled as BIG! (Build it Green!). Dr. Oprean’s specific role is in the design of the educational digital tools in collaboration with our partner, Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB).

NSF RETTL as a Co-PI with Jung Hyup Kim (PI) and Kangwon Seo (Co-PI) for $850,000. Titled Research on the Use of Real-Time Tracking and Eye-Tracking Technology for Integrating Metacognition and Augmented Reality into Undergraduate Engineering Laboratories

This grant explores the use of Augmented Reality technology with real-time eye-tracking to understand how metacognition impacts engineering student lab work. The focus is to develop the eye-tracking feature to support a metacognition monitoring system that accompanies a biomechanics lab at the University of Missouri. The use of AR technology enables the lab to be available without the need for in-person engineering labs so that social distancing and other challenges faced by in-person labs in recent years. Dr. Oprean’s role in this project is to work through the presentation of the learning material within the AR environment and to test it.