The Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) fields are increasingly driven by emerging technologies. For academic programs preparing students for careers in these fields, assessment of both the overall curriculum as well as specific course learning outcomes is an essential process to align with the needs and expectations of the companies and practitioners in these disciplines. Faculty in the Department of Architecture and the Department of Construction Management at a University in the USA have recently conducted multiple studies structured to identify technology trends in their respective industries. The studies collected data from practitioners and companies related to the extent of their use of evolving technologies such as Building Information Modeling (BIM) as a means of assessing the course content and learning outcomes. To further assess the relevance of course content and outcomes, data were collected from architecture and construction management students that had completed at least one of the required cooperative education courses. These semester-long courses provide opportunities for students to apply knowledge and skill sets developed over their academic careers in a professional setting. Therefore, documenting student perceptions of the relevance of courses to their experience in a professional work setting was used to further develop insight into the relevance of course outcomes. An on-line survey was used to collect data to document student perceptions of the relevance of course content to the tasks assigned by their employer during their cooperative education experiences. In addition to collecting data associated with the use of digital applications such as BIM, data was also collected related to other discipline-specific technical course content and to perceptions of overall employer expectations for student’s technical skill sets and preparedness. The survey utilized Likert-type questions to document student perceptions of relevance of course content in relation to academic major, level of degree completion, and number of cooperative education courses completed. The responses were analyzed using non-parametric tests (ordinal chi-square, Kendall's tau correlation, Kruskal-Wallis with a Dunn post-hoc test), and the results and conclusions are documented in this paper.

Keywords: Curriculum assessment, architecture, construction management, cooperative education.