Opportunities for Collaboration between Electrical Engineering and Special Education Majors at the University of Costa Rica: Social Outreach Projects to Benefit Disabled Population Groups

Abstract

A two-year social outreach project executed jointly by a group of Special Education and Electrical Engineering majors at the University of Costa Rica from 2018 to 2020, provided students with the opportunity to exchange experiences and sharpen skills, such as conducting a bibliographic research paper and developing a platform to benefit population groups with disabilities within the context of education and their daily life. The impact of this experience is reflected through student descriptions of the activities carried out by the participants of the working groups, each representing either of the two aforementioned majors. These participants also stated that they had gained valuable insight and appreciation of the each other´s area of study. Information regarding student perception was obtained from a survey that they completed and analysis of the results. Student also shared their opinions regarding their experience in their bibliographic research project. According to the results, university students benefit through this type of learning, particularly since this type of collaboration exposes them to more information and, as a result of the collaboration, they are better able to assess and detect learning opportunities. These types of multidisciplinary linkages reveal that there is a need for this type of collaboration which is helpful to addressing many complex problems faced by society.