Writing an Effective Construction Case Study

Introduction

THE NEED to attract more of the most talented students to study an undergraduate construction degree program is ever more urgent. Part of the difficulty in persuading more young people to pursue study in Construction beyond the compulsory stage is their perception that many of the studies to which they have been exposed are irrelevant to their real life. A consequence of the failure to attract sufficient numbers of able students into construction degree programs with a sufficiently strong logical, managerial and scientific background, undermines the quality and cost-effectiveness of construction. Yet, such a background is required in order to underpin many state-of-the-art engineering and technology applications.

The situation of how to correct the many perceived ills of our science, construction and engineering education programs has occupied the attention of scientific societies including the National Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (Project 2061: Science for All Americans, 1989). Construction schools around the nation are seeking curriculum reform and classroom innovations to aid in rectifying the deficiency in construction and engineering literacy. Educators have been quick to point out that science and engineering education is not user-friendly, disproportionately turning off large numbers of women and minorities. This is also true for construction education. One innovation that holds exceptional promise--yet has had limited trial among construction faculties to apply in their classes--is the case study method. Case studies have long been used as a means of motivating students at all levels to understand real world problems and their solutions.

Limited case studies have been used in undergraduate construction teaching as occasional stories told by an instructor from his experience. James B. Conant of Harvard University organized an entire course around this mode of teaching (Conant 1949). However, unlike the current practice in business and most other fields, which present cases within a framework of discussion or Socratic dialogue, Conant presented cases entirely in a lecture format.

In contrast, business and law schools have had a long tradition of using real or simulated cases to teach students about their fields. Harvard University has been the leader in developing cases in these subjects (Christensen 1986), and has produced faculty who have carried their enthusiasm for the method to other institutions. Other disciplines such as medicine, psychology, and teacher's education have used the method to capture the imaginations of students.

In some disciplines including construction, cases are typically written as dilemmas that give a personal history of an individual, institution, or business faced with a problem that must be solved. Background information, charts, graphs, and tables may be integrated into the tale or appended. The instructor's goal is to help the students work through the facts and analysis of the problem and then consider possible solutions and consequences of the actions they might take (Fruchter 2001, Moskalski 2002).

Benefits of Using Case Study

Case study can bring real world problems to the class and provides a base to discuss it as it happens and is solved. But the benefits mostly depend on type and writing style of the case study, student compositions and interests, and how it is discussed in the class.  Sometimes, case studies are overburdened with the formal writing style—that scientific and dreadfully boring way of writing in the passive and third person voice (Clyde Freeman, 1995). This author occasionally uses case studies in the teaching of undergraduate and graduate construction classes. By teaching those case studies, he found enormous benefits of case study for the construction students which are: 

1. The case study method involves learning by doing, the development of analytical and decision-making skills, the internalization of learning, learning how to grapple with messy real-life problems, the development of skills in oral communications, and team work.
2. Looking at Bloom's (1956) taxonomy of cognitive learning, Cases focus more on "knowledge" than on theory and content.
3. The case process is inductive rather than deductive. In this method, the focus is on students learning through their joint, cooperative effort, rather than on the instructor conveying his/her views to students.
4. By studying cases, students gain confidence in themselves related to real life problems. It is also a rehearsal for real life problems.
5. Cases have strong appeal for many students who are turned off by traditional lecture oriented courses with a concentration on facts and content rather than the development of higher-order thinking and decision making skills. The author found, case driven courses have higher percentage of attendance rather than non-case driven courses.
6. The case method of presentation is extraordinarily flexible as a teaching tool, can be used in several classes and in different settings.
7. Cases are equally suited to the collaborative/cooperative learning format in small groups but can easily be used in large discussion classes, as exemplified in law and business schools. They can be adapted for large construction classes.
8. Case study can be easily disseminated among the entire construction faculty when it is well-prepared and tested with the incorporation of new technology.
9. The use of case studies in construction encourage students to critically appraise problems and solutions of construction they hear through the media, to understand the process of decisions and its limitations, and to be able to ask more critical questions during the decision making process.

In addition, a carefully-chosen case study can act as a real motivator to students and help to convince them that Construction education does have a valuable, indeed essential, role in the advancement of technology and management and is relevant to their highly technologically- developed world.

Types of Construction Cases

Many cases are best developed from scratch. This is the process used for most construction cases and although it requires considerable time, it has the advantage that only essential material is included in the writing. The case may be customized exactly to meet the instructor's goals. Two types of cases, appropriate to construction education are given below:

1. Decision or dilemma cases present problems or decisions that need to be made by a central character in a drama. The case usually consists of a short introductory paragraph setting up the problem to be considered and may introduce the decision-maker at the moment of crisis. A background section fills in the historical information necessary to understand the situation. A narrative section then presents the recent developments leading up to the crisis that our protagonist faces. Exhibits (appendices) follow including tables, graphs, letters, or documents that help lay the foundation for a possible solution to the problem. Examples are a structure which was failed in an accident trying to decide about using a steel component rather than concrete, or a construction project manager faced with a decision of punishing a controversial substance abuser.

2. Appraisal cases ("issue cases") are used to teach students the skills of analysis. The material is focused around answering questions like "What is going on here?" This type of case frequently lacks a central character in the drama and generally stops short of demanding that the students make a decision. Examples would be the impact of the presence of toxic substance on the construction site, or a collection of papers and data showing the possible effects of improper schedules on project completion, or a selection of articles arguing whether cement I is the main reason for the structure failure.

How to Write a Case

There are two basic questions that face anyone interested in using the case study in his/her class. The first is how is he going to write the case? The second is how is he going to teach the case? The two questions are clearly related, for the case often will be written differently for different teaching formats.

How much work is required in writing the case varies enormously depending upon the materials the instructor decides to provide the students. For example, the author takes some cases  from the Engineering News Record (ENR), uses a single 90-100- word paragraph as the basis for an entire class period. As class begins, he gives the students this brief introduction of a construction accident or a temporary structure failure. Then the author asks the students to write concise responses to the following questions as a project manager and/or superintendent of the site: Why did the accident happen?  What could s/he to eliminate that accident before the incident? What corrective actions should s/he do after the accident? What are the consequences of accidents on projects? Then, with gentle and probing questioning, the author is able to draw out a miraculous number of vital points about the safety hazards in construction sites. At the end of the class period, the discussion is a blizzard of speculations, explanations, and conclusions, and virtually all of the students are eager to read the original article published in the Engineering News Record or the other journals and/or consult with Occupational Safety and Health Professionals to see if their suggestions are correct.

At the other extreme, cases may take elaborate preparation requiring dozens of pages of text and extensive research which the author generally uses for graduate classes. These cases may require over a year of information gathering and interviews along with hundreds of dollars of investment and lots of time from the faculty to develop a case that may extend over several class sessions. For example, the author uses three cases in semester to teach Advanced Operations-constructability, value engineering and productivity class in addition to covering other required materials.

Another technique is to simply collect a series of articles focused around a single topic. These articles are put on library reserve, or copied with permission from the journal involved and then given to the students. If accompanied by a short series of questions to guide their reading, an outstanding case can be developed. For example, several articles for trench accidents can be given to the students and provide a basis to discuss why those trench accidents occur-due to the lack of employee training; and/or inadequate supervision or coordination; and/or inadequate supply of personal protective equipments and other concerns.

Elements of Writing a Good Case Study

Flesch, working in Associated Press, used the straight jacket formula of writing stories using the traditional “Who-What-Where-When-Why-and-How” approach (Linguest Flesch). He asked, “How can readers absorb the main facts of the news” if this tired approach “is subordinated to the human interest treatment?”

Central to Flesch’s theme is the axiom “Write as you speak.” Be straightforward in your sentences. But the idea, “write as you speak,” is sound advice for case writing but difficult to follow. Whatever approach the case writer can take, he should be careful about the following important elements.

Know the audience

Writing for elementary school children isn’t the same as writing for construction project managers. The problems are different. So are the language and the traditions. Here’s are some of the differences between freshman and senior construction students.

Freshmen have strong desires... they are fond of victory, for youth likes to be superior... they are sanguine... they live their lives in anticipation (adventurers)... they have high aspirations... they are fond of laughter... may not be practical.

Seniors... are suspicious about their futures... they aspire to the mere necessities and comforts of existence... they have less anticipation... they are more realistic about their life like practical, down-to-earth and bread-and –butter stuff.

So, when the writer wants to convey information to the young (freshmen), s/he should take a hint: make it a story—with a simple and positive problems rather than discussion of complex problems.

Not just the facts

In construction education, facts are important. But facts alone do not help students to learn better. It is always better to use as many interesting practical examples with the facts. If there are no good examples, dashes of color, “and a good assortment of useless information,” the students won’t remember the facts.

Goal of the Case

Case study should always have a goal and/or point of discussion. A good readable case study is always written based on a point of view. The instructor always undergoes trials and iteration for solving the case study problems. The case writer can write the case from the vantage point of a typical member of a group faced with a problem—the generic victim. But it is better to have a hero and he must have a name. And in the serious problem cases, the names should not be cute. Even with fictionalized case problems, it is better to make them as real as possible. The best heroes are ones that students can identify in their mind and are consistent with the problems.

Student interests

Student interests are also important element for writing a good case study. If the case study can not gain the students’ attention, it is less likely to bring any benefits to the class. It is not a bad idea to use many personal names and personal pronouns in the case study. 

Use dialogue

Virtually any writing passages can be turned into dialogue. Students will choose to read dialogue over almost any other writing style. The percentage of dialogue use varies enormously in different kinds of writing. In technical papers the percentage will be zero while in popular magazine articles it will be between 12 and 15 percent and can reach 50 percent. In construction case study, it can be 2 to 5 percent.

When the writer is writing as he speaks, he would use a lot of contractions. For example, he writes can’t, shouldn’t, I’ve, we’ll, don’t, didn’t, and let’s instead of their more formal counterparts. He would write, Can I go? instead of May I go? If he were writing a real dialogue, he wouldn’t worry if he used the same word twice in a sentence and repeated them, because that’s the way real people speak.

Sentence length

Sentence length has a significant impact on readability of the case study. If it is too long, it is difficult to address the problems. Short sentences are easy to read and easy to comprehend. However, too many of them in a row give a jerky flavor, which is fine if the writer wish to give his writing a breathless quality, but it can get irritating if it goes on too long. Use of complex sentences now and again is not a really good idea in the case study.

Great start and strong end

Start with a memorable and personable sentence, which will immediately capture student interests. Students will want to read more. The ideal opening will do three things: grab the reader, introduce a character, and establish a setting. The writer may not need to wait even until the first sentence. Capture the readers with a catchy title or a quotation right off the bat even before they get to the opening words. No matter how the writer does it, he has to get their attention right away. That’s where the hook should be.

So it is a good idea to start with a great beginning, and then continue the fact in chronological order. Soon the writer will be in the middle of the case study; that’s where the meat of the case is, and he will leave that to students for their thinking. It is good to try to make the end of the case interesting and worth thinking. If the end is not dramatic, students will not put in enough time to think.

Avoid heavy sounding words

There are simple ways of saying things and there are convoluted ways. Good to choose simple, American words rather than English words. Try to use simple alternative rather than heavy prepositions and conjunctions. Here are few examples:

For the purposes of = for
Along the lines of = like
From the point of view that = for
In the case of = if
With the result that = so that

Here are a few “too heavy connectives” that the writer should avoid: accordingly, consequently, hence, and thus. All of these can be replaced by the tiny word so. These changes will lighten up the case study and make it more enjoyable.

Keeping the Balance

The difficulty with introducing case studies into the curriculum is getting the balance right. If a case study relies on too many technical details then it can detract from the application and weaken the impact which it seeks to make. On the other hand, too simplistic problem can offer a false prospectus and mislead students into believing that the knowledge which they require in their studies is at a low level. Further, if an unrealistic construction problem is offered to the students then they will see through the smokescreen and the exercise will have been counter-productive. If a case study is applied to a situation to which it has not been applied hitherto, to which it is not currently being applied and to which it is highly unlikely to be applied in the future, then the students will get the impression that the Construction educators are desperately seeking applications in order to justify the presence of their subject in the curriculum.

Conclusions

The case studies should be both readable and interesting. The case studies that the students like best are those that rank high on both readability and interest scales. Of course, there are other factors involved in making great cases: the content the instructor wants to cover; the type of subject he has chosen; the time to cover the case; and so on. The instructor can take any case, topic, or story and write it—readable or unreadable—interesting or uninteresting.

The case method cannot solve all of the ills in the teaching of construction. Even devotees admit that it is not the best method to deliver a plethora of facts, figures, and principles. However, the case method is ideal to develop higher-order reasoning skills (Bloom’s Taxonomy), which many construction instructors believe they should go for. When cases are used occasionally within a course, they spice up the semester and show students how their learning impacts on their effective decisions.

When cases become the predominate method of instruction, the question of information coverage becomes an issue. Traditionalists argue they can't cover the same amount of information using cases. So using the cases in the construction course, depends on how a particular instructor wants to teach that class, what important topic he wants to cover and how the case study was written. So limitations of case study should be kept in mind during writing construction case study.

References

American Association for the Advancement of Science. (1989). Project 2061: Science for All Americans. Washington, DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science. 

Bloom, Benjamin S. (ed.). (1956). Taxonomy of Educational Objectives: Handbook I: Cognitive Domain. New York: David McKay Company, Inc.

Christensen, C. Roland with Abby J. Hansen. (1986). Teaching and the Case Method. Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing Division.

Conant, James B. (1949). The Growth of the Experimental Sciences: An Experiment in General Education. New Haven, CT: Yale Univ. Press.

Flesch, Linguist R. 1 The Art of Readable Writing. http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/projects/cases/teaching/novel.html.

Freeman, Clyde. (1995). Case Studies in Science A Novel Method of Science Education. Journal of College ScienceTeachers, PP. 221-229, Arlington, VA.

Fruchter, Renate. (2002). Dimension of Teamwork Education, Int. J. of Engrg. Ed., Vol. 17, No. 4, pp 426-430, Great Britain.

Merry, Robert W. (1954). Preparation to teach a case. In The Case Method at the Harvard Business School. (ed.) McNair, M.P. with A.C. Hersum. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Moskalski, Norme. (2002). Factors that Enhance or Constrain Implementation of Team Activities in Engineering Courses, Int. J. of Engrg. Ed., Vol. 18, No. 3, PP 264-274, Great Britain.

National Academy of Sciences. (1989). On Being a Scientist. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.