Paper ID #34354

Poetry Writing in Engineering Education: Results and Insights From anExploratory Study

Prof. Elif Akcali, University of Florida

Dr. Elif Akcalı is an Associate Professor in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at theUniversity of Florida (UF), where she is also The Cottmeyer Family Innovative Frontiers Faculty Fellow.She is an industrial engineer, a visual artist, and an explorer of the interplay between thinking and makingin the arts and engineering. In 2013, Dr. Akcalı was selected as the Creative Scholar-in-Residence atthe University of Florida, and spent two semesters in the School of Theater and Dance (SoTD). After thisexperience, Dr. Akcalı began experimenting with the use of arts-integrated teaching and learning methodsin engineering education.

Mariana Buraglia, University of Florida

Mariana Buraglia has both a master’s and bachelor’s degree from the Department of Industrial and Sys-tems Engineering at the University of Florida (UF). She is passionate about science, technology, en-gineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) education and research. Through the Society of HispanicProfessional Engineers (SHPE), she led an outreach program to promote STEAM education for elemen-tary to high school students. She also served as a facilitator for a Girls Who Code (GWC) chapter and asa teaching assistant for four semesters of a programming fundamentals course. She is a strong proponentof fomenting divergent thinking in the engineering curriculum specifically by leveraging the arts.

Ms. Andrea Essenfeld, University of Florida

Andrea Essenfeld is a recent graduate from the University of Florida’s, earning her bachelor’s degree inIndustrial and Systems Engineering in December 2020. Her undergraduate research focuses on creativitytests and divergent thinking. She is passionate about how the mind learns and expresses itself, and thushas been working most recently in the engineering education domain.

Dr. Jade Williams, University of Florida

Dr. Williams is a Lecturer in the Dial Center for Oral and Written Communication at the University ofFlorida (UF). She has an active research program employing qualitative and arts-based methods to in-vestigate the complex and powerful relationships that exist between human communication and biology,health and well-being; conflict management and negotiation; crisis Communication in Emergency Medi-cal Teams; human resilience; narrative identity and constructions of self and other as well as stereotypesand stigma. In addition to teaching and research, Dr. Williams presents workshops and seminars, bothlocally and nationally, on a variety of organizational and interpersonal communication-related topics. Sheis also the Director of the UF Dial Center Ambassador Leadership Program.

c©American Society for Engineering Education, 2021

Poetry Writing in Engineering Education:

Preliminary Results and Insights from an Exploratory Study

Abstract

To cultivate creative thinking and communication skills development, we created and incorporated

two poetry-writing assignments into two sections of a required, upper-level undergraduate course

in an industrial and systems engineering program. The first assignment, due at the beginning of

the semester, asked students to write a poem about themselves using a specific poetic form. The

second assignment, due at the end of the semester, asked students to write a poem about a technical

topic from the course using the same poetic form. At the end of the semester, the poems from 61

students who gave their consent to participate in the study were collected and entered as data. We

analyzed a subset of these poems for themes qualitatively using open and axial coding and constant

comparison. In this paper, we discuss the specifics of the chosen poetic form, describe our

approach to content analysis using a mixed-methods approach, present our preliminary findings,

and discuss potential benefits of poetry-writing to creative thinking and communication skills

development in engineering education.

Keywords. Creative thinking, communication, poetry, inventory control, supply chain systems.

Introduction

The so-called 21st Century Skills are a set of abilities required to succeed professionally in the

information age. The top four of these skills include critical thinking, creative thinking,

collaboration, and communication [1]. In a typical engineering education curriculum, critical

thinking is addressed effectively. Also, students develop their collaboration skills via project-based

courses that have become increasingly widespread in engineering education in the last two

decades. Furthermore, communication skills are often addressed through the inclusion of a

technical communication course or by otherwise satisfying the communication component of

established general education requirements. Laboratory experiences and project-based courses

emphasize the development of technical communication skills via reports and presentations, as

well. However, it should be noted that these courses predominantly emphasize communication for

technical audiences. Of the top four 21st Century Skills, creative thinking is the one skill that is

addressed either in an ad hoc manner or not explicitly at all in an engineering curriculum.

In order to enhance creative thinking and communication skills of engineering students, we explore

the incorporation of poetry writing for a required upper-level course in a large public university’s

Industrial and Systems Engineering curriculum. Poetry, as a medium of communication, has been

used to pass stories and detailed accounts of historical events from one generation to the next.

Also, poetry, as an art form, is an important tool for imaginative or creative self-expression. In

fact, the use of poetry for the cultivation of creative thinking, imagination, reflection, and

communication skills has been widely recognized in several scientific fields, including medicine

[2, 3, 4], nursing education [5, 6], science education [7], mathematics [8], neuroscience [9, 10],

biology [11], and conservation science [12] among others. Hence, it can be argued that poetry can

be an effective teaching and learning tool in engineering education as well.

The remainder of the paper is organized as follows: In the next section, we provide a review of the

related literature. The following section describes the course and the specifics of the poetry

assignment. We then present an overview of the design and execution of the study focusing on the

participants of the study as well as data collection and data analysis approaches. The following

two sections present our results from data analysis and discuss our findings, respectively.

Concluding remarks, as well as a discussion of ongoing and future work, are included in the last

section.

Related Literature

Our work is closely related to the stream of existing research that focuses on the use of poetry in

engineering education. In what follows, we review the existing work in detail.

Millan [13] describes the use of poetry as an active learning tool in a freshman-level course.

Specifically, students are asked to (1) choose an artifact (e.g., a printer), (2) conduct research on

it, (3) prepare a brief document that uses images and writing to analyze its parts and (4) write a

poem about it. The students read published poetry, compose their own poems to describing how

something works, participate in a poetry-writing workshop to share, receive feedback on and revise

their poems. No poetic form was enforced, and the poems were graded as pass and fail.

Mourtos [14] adapted the approach developed by Millan [13] and incorporated it into student

portfolios in a junior-level course in aerospace engineering. Specifically, students were asked to

(1) write a poem on an aerodynamic concept or artifact of their choice and (2) include a sketch in

any form they would like to include with their poem to complete their learning portfolio. There is

no specific information in regard to whether any poetic form was enforced. Furthermore, it is not

clear how poems were graded.

Gunn [15] organized a poetry contest during Engineers’ Week in the College of Engineering at

Michigan State University to provide students with a venue to demonstrate their creative talent

along with additional opportunities to develop their communication skills and to write for pleasure.

There were no constraints imposed on the poetic form or the topic of the poetry. The contest was

open to all engineering students, and the winning works were curated as a show. It is not clear who

judged the poems.

Christy [16] organized a poetry contest open to all students, faculty, staff, and alumni of the

Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering at The Ohio State University. Contest

judges were recruited from the Department of English. Participants could compose poems on

technical and non-technical subjects. A survey tool that measures attitudes toward creativity,

communication, role of humanities in technical education, and poetry prior to and after the poetry

contest was designed [17]. To our knowledge, results from the survey have not been published,

but participant feedback indicated that the experience was received positively by both the

contestants and the judges [17, 18, 19].

With the exception of one [14], none of the existing work specifically addressed the incorporation

of poetry into existing curricula in upper-level technical courses. More importantly, none of the

existing work conducted a detailed analysis of the student-written poems to further understand the

degree to which poetry writing could enhance learning and teaching in engineering education. In

our work, we address this important gap. Specifically, we use content analysis, investigate the

resulting data to examine student-written poems, and provide insights as to how poetry can

facilitate the development of creative thinking and communication skills of engineering students.

Data Collection

Course Overview. The course of interest is a 3-credit hour, required undergraduate course that is

offered both in fall and spring semesters in one and two sections, respectively, with approximately

45 junior or senior students per section.

Course Content. The course material focuses on inventory and supply chain systems; specific

topics covered include (1) fundamentals of inventory systems; (2) fundamentals of transportation

systems; (3) analysis and design of logistics systems; (4) supply chain management and

coordination; and (5) demand forecasting. The course aims to develop modeling and analysis

abilities of the students to investigate inventory, logistics and supply chain problems faced by

today's firms.

Course Delivery. The course was designed to be delivered via lectures in-person. Reading

assignments from current news media along with relevant business and trade magazines were used

to supplement lecture content. Once the university moved to fully remote learning in March 2020

due to COVID-19 pandemic, the course was transferred to an on-line format. While one of the

instructors delivered lectures live on-line, the other instructor pre-recorded the lectures.

Poetic Structure of Choice. An “I am” poem is a form of poetry that relies on the literary device

of personification. Personification is a literary device, or a figure of speech, that either gives human

affective, behavioral, and cognitive attributes to a non-human entity (e.g., inanimate object, idea,

etc.) or talks about the non-human entity as if it were a human. “I am” poems have a simple

structure as demonstrated in Figure 1. This simple structure is easy to communicate to engineering

students, regardless of the students’ experience and/or interest in creative writing or poetry. While

the majority of the lines of the “I am” poem invites the writer to use literal language, some

encourage the use of figurative language. Specifically, the lines that start with “I hear,” “I see,”

and “I want” in the first stanza as well as the lines that start with “I feel” and “I touch” in the

second stanza prompt the use of figurative language. This inherent duality in the structure of an “I

am” poem that accommodates the use of both literal and figurative language makes this type of

poem sufficiently accessible to engineering students, who are primarily trained via technical

writing courses, and, hence, are comfortable with the use of literal language. The limited use of

figurative language allows the students to tap into their creative capacities to the degree that they

feel comfortable.

Instructions. “I am” poem assignments were described and presented as a creative writing

component for the course. The assignment included three distinct elements. Students were given

two separate poetry-writing assignments during the semester. In addition, at the end of the

semester, the students were asked to respond to four questions that invited them to reflect on their

experience with these assignments as well . For the first assignment, due at the end of the second

week of classes, the students were asked to write an “I am” poem about themselves. For the second

assignment, due during the last week of classes, the students were asked to write an “I am” poem

on a topic related to the course material.

I am (two special characteristics)

I wonder (something you are actually curious about)

I hear (an imaginary sound)

I see (an imaginary sight)

I want (an actual desire)

I am (the first line of the poem restated)

I pretend (something you pretend to do)

I feel (a feeling about something imaginary)

I touch (an imaginary touch)

I worry (something that really bothers you)

I cry (something that makes you very sad)

I am (the first line of the poem repeated)

I understand (something you know is true)

I say (something you believe in)

I dream (something you actually dream about)

I try (something you make an effort to do)

I hope (something you actually hope for)

I am (the first line of the poem repeated)

Figure 1. Instructions for an “I am” Poem.

The students were asked to adhere to the specific poetic structure and use the prescribed verbs of

the “I am” poem for the first assignment. For the second assignment, the students were offered the

option to change the verbs throughout the poem if they wanted to do so. Furthermore, they were

required to include an additional line at the end of the poem to state specifically what the poem is

about. While the suggestion to change the verbs was aimed to give more space to the students to

be creative if they wanted to be so, the requirement to include the additional line at the end was

considered to provide the grader a reference in case the poem was substantially figurative. Both of

these enhancements were included based on our previous experience with these assignments prior

to the collection of data for the current project.

Grading. Each assignment was graded out of 10 points. Although the first poem was graded based

on completeness, points were deducted for repeated grammatical mistakes and spelling errors. The

second poem was graded based on completeness as well as accuracy. Each assignment counted as

one point (1 percent) of the total 100 points possible for the class.

Data Analysis

Overview of the Coding Method. The student-created “I am” poems were qualitatively analyzed

for themes using standard open and axial coding. Following a modified version of Furman’s five-

round coding method [20], we completed our coding in five distinct steps:

1. Round One: The poems were read initially with the sole intent of familiarizing with the

poems and the topic by all three coders. No coding was done in this phase.

2. Round Two: The poems were read through noting general impressions.

3. Round Three: The poems were analyzed line-by-line using open and axial coding [21]. Bi-

weekly research meetings allowed for collaborative discussions and consensus of identified

codes among the three researchers who independently coded the poems. When needed the

fourth researcher, an expert in thematic analysis and arts-based research, reviewed the

poems as well as the codes to resolve any remaining disagreements.

4. Round Four: Themes were identified by the researchers independently based on codes from

Round Three. Again, weekly or bi-weekly research meetings allowed for collaborative

discussion and consensus of identified themes among the researchers. Again, when needed

the fourth researcher reviewed the codes and the themes to resolve any remaining

disagreements.

5. Round Five: After the themes were identified using the above method, the researchers

conducted a cross-category thematic comparison.

Poems Coded. Poems written for the second assignment were included in our dataset if the student

consented to participate in the study. First, we grouped according to the broader topical area

(deterministic inventory models, stochastic inventory models, transportation and logistics, supply

chain design, forecasting and contemporary topics in supply chain management). For the purposes

of the preliminary investigation reported here, we analyzed four poems that focused on ABC

Analysis (which was a subset of the poems that focused on deterministic inventory models). Figure

2 presents one of the student-written poems on ABC Analysis that was written in response to the

second poetry-writing assignment in the course.

I am interested on the consumption values

I wonder if all your products are important

I hear that demand differs from product to product

I see that the class A will have the highest relevance

I want to classify your items

I am analyzing your cumulative item values

I pretend to help you prioritize your items

I feel that some items are more important than others

I touch three different categories

I worry about how you utilize your resources

I cry if I cannot help you to improve your inventory

I understand that 20% of the inventory represent most of the profit

I say that Pareto principle is my mantra`

I dream that I can help to optimize your inventory

I try to let you know what is more important

I hope you will optimize your stock resources

I am the ABC analysis

Figure 2. A student-written “I am” Poem on ABC Analysis.

The original poem structure (see Figure 1) directed the students to repeat the same line starting

with “I am…” four times. However, some of the students did not necessarily follow this instruction

and changed the content of that specific poem line. While we eliminated any repeated lines, we

retained the unique lines in our data set. Of the four poems on the topic ABC Analysis, while three

of them had 16 distinct lines, one poem had 17 distinct lines (the one in Figure 2). Consequently,

we had a total of 65 poem lines to analyze. Codes were assigned to each line individually.

Overview of the research team. Poems were coded by three researchers. One coder, the subject

matter expert for supply chain systems, was one of the instructors and the developer of the lecture

notes. The other two coders had taken the graduate version of the course. Another researcher on

the team served as the subject matter expert for content analysis. All of the coders studied the

lecture notes to develop an understanding of how the material on ABC Analysis was delivered.

Identification of the Coding Categories. The determination of the coding categories evolved over

time depending on the observations of the researchers.

Phase 1. We began by analyzing each poem line by line to assess the “correctness” of the line, as

this was the approach used to grade the assignments for the course. At end of this phase, we made

three observations:

1. Some lines could be deemed as being correct more easily than others, whereas some lines could

be deemed to be partially correct or incorrect. A careful examination of this revealed that this

difficulty was due to (i) the poetic structure itself that allowed for the use of both literal and

figurative language interchangeably throughout the poem and/or (ii) the specific verbs,

particularly those that enabled the use of figurative language. The lines with literal language

were easier to evaluate, whereas the lines with figurative language were more difficult.

2. Majority of the lines included some key terms and concepts related to ABC analysis

representing or capturing a specific detail of the purpose, process, and the expected outcome

of such an analysis.

3. With a few exceptions, most of the lines had an affective quality representing or demonstrating

a specific human trait (such as practicality, confidence, or sarcasm).

Phase 2. Based on our three key observations from Phase 1, we decided to code the poems using

three distinct categories, including (i) the tone of language; (ii) supply chain concepts; and (iii)

emotions.

1. For the tone of language used, a closed-coding approach was adopted. We coded each poem

line as having (i) literal, (ii) literal and figurative, or (iii) figurative tone of language. Each

poem line received a single tone code. If a poem line was written in a factual manner, the poem

line was coded as being literal. In contrast, if a poem line was written with more metaphorical

and/or abstract language, the poem line was coded as being figurative. If a poem line

incorporated a mixture of both approaches, the poem line was coded as both (literal and

figurative). We identifying the tone code across the literal to figurative scale was mostly a

straightforward decision; the verbs for each of the poem lines and the instructions for the poem

shaped the decisions of the students.

2. For supply chain concepts captured, an open-coding approach was adopted. Researcher

consensus was most easily reached for the supply chain concepts. When necessary, a poem

line received more than one supply chain concept code. Resulting condensed codes conveyed

the key concepts related to the description and application of ABC Analysis as well as the

interpretation of the results from such an analysis.

3. For emotions reflected, a closed-coding approach was adopted. We coded each poem line as

reflecting one of the eight basic human emotions of (i) trust, (ii) joy, (iii) anticipation, (iv)

sadness, (v) disgust, (vi) fear, (vii) anger, and (viii) surprise [22]. We note that since some of

the poem lines reflected complex emotions that could not be represented using only one of the

eight basic emotions, a poem line could receive more than one emotion code. Coding for

emotions displayed a range at the beginning but researcher consensus was eventually reached.

Results

We present our preliminary results on the tone of language used, supply chain concepts captured,

and emotions reflected in the poems.

Analysis of the Tone of Language Used. Out of the 65 poem lines coded, 48% (31 lines) were

coded as literal, 23% (15 lines), and 29% (19 lines) as figurative as shown in Figure 3. These

preliminary results based on this dataset indicated a student preference towards the use of literal

language, as a total of 71% (considering figurative and both codes together) of the poem lines used

literal language. However, a student affinity towards the use of figurative language appeared to be

strong, as a total of 52% (considering literal and both codes together) of poem lines used figurative

language.

Figure 3. Pie chart representation of total line tone count.

We also analyzed each poem individually. Table 1 shows the summary statistics per poem.

Specifically, average number of poem lines that received a specific type of code along with the

standard deviation as well as the minimum and the number of codes for each poem are presented.

Summary statistics highlight that the use of figurative language varied most in our sample with

minimum and maximum values of 0 and 9, respectively.

Tone Code Total Number of Tone Codes per Poem

Average (Standard Deviation) Range

(Minimum, Maximum) Literal 7.74 (3.10) (5, 12) Both 3.75 (1.89) (1, 5) Figurative 4.75 (3.77) (0, 9)

Table 1. Summary statistics for the total count of tone codes per poem.

Figure 5 depicts the distribution of tone code composition for all four poems. While poem 288

appears to be the most figurative out of the four, poem 114 is the most literal. Poems 168 and 186

appear to be more balanced in their tone code distributions. This suggests variability among

students in regard to the tone of language used.

Literal

48%

Both

23%

Figurative

29%

Number of Poem Lines Classified based on Tone Code

Literal Both Figurative

Figure 4. Tone code breakdown per poem.

Figure 6 shows the breakdown of the tone code composition for root verbs of the poem lines. The

verbs wonder, hear, and cry yielded the most figurative poem lines, while say, hope, and the

second and third am yielded only literal poem lines. This demonstrates that although providing the

“I am” poem template to students may help structure the assignment, the verb choices may

influence the choice of figurative and/or literal tone of the poem.

Figure 5. Tone code composition for root verbs of the poem lines.

1

3

1

1

1

1

1

1

3

3

2

1

2

1

1

3

2

2

1

1

1

4

4

3

1

4

3

3

1

1

2

3

1

1

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

am

hope

try

dream

say

understand

cry

worry

touch

feel

pretend

am

want

see

hear

wonder

am

Percentage

Ver

b

Tone Code Composition For Each Poem Line

Figurative Both Literal

12

5

8

65 5

4

10

6

4

9

114 168 186 288

Tone Code Breakdown by Poem ID

Literal Both Figurative

Analysis of Supply Chain Concepts Captured. For the analysis of supply chain concepts captured

by the poems, we used open coding. An example of our open coding process is provided in Table

2, where a four-step approach is used to identify and extract any inherent supply chain concept in

each poem line.

Step Process Example (Poem ID: 186; Line: 12)

1 Read the poem line as is I say it’s important to focus on what people want the most

2 Highlight words within the line that reference

supply chain key terms

I say it’s important to focus on what people want the most

3 Extract the phrases that reference supply

chain key term(s)

focus on what people want the most

4 Relate it back to the general supply chain

concept(s) referenced. In this case there are

two. These now become the condensed codes

Item Classification

Different Level of Importance

Table 2. Identification and extraction of supply chain concepts via open coding.

After the initial identification and extraction of the concepts as demonstrated in Table 2, we pooled

individual concepts into broader groups of related concepts and obtained our preliminary codes,

as they appeared more frequently in different poem lines. Finally, we categorized the related codes

into larger, more general categories to obtain our condensed final codes. We obtained a total 14

such codes. It is important to reiterate that multiple supply chain concept codes were permitted per

poem line. As a result, the total number of supply chain concept codes (93 in total) is more than

the total number of poem lines (65 in total) in the data set. Tables 3 and 4 provide an overview of

the total supply chain concept code counts as well as the summary statistics, respectively. Table 3

indicates that the concept that was most referred to by the students is Item Classification, which is

the essence, i.e., the core idea, of ABC Analysis. The other two concepts that emerged were System

Improvement and Widely-Used. This is also not surprising as the lecture notes for the course and

the examples discussed in class emphasized that ABC Analysis was broadly applicable and that it

could be used to initiate any type of system improvement project to identify the important elements

of the system that would need to be studied and controlled most closely. Similar observations can

be made by Table 5 based on the total count of supply chain concept codes per poem.

Table 3. Total supply chain concept code counts for all four poems.

Supply Chain Concept Code

Total Number of Supply Chain Concept

Codes in the Entire Data Set

Percentage

(%)

Item classification 17 18.1

System improvement 11 11.7

Widely-used 10 10.6

Important 8 8.5

Margin of error 8 8.5

ABC Analysis 7 7.4

Pareto Principle 7 7.4

Parameter 5 5.3

Management 5 5.3

Inventory systems 4 4.3

Natural 4 4.3

Distribution Value Analysis 3 3.2

20% 2 2.1

Miscellaneous 2 2.1

TOTAL 93 100.0

Supply Chain Concept Code

Total Number of Supply Chain

Concept Codes per Poem

Average (Standard Deviation)

Range

(Minimum, Maximum)

Item Classification 4.25 (2.06) (2, 7)

System Improvement 2.75 (2.06) (0, 5)

Widely-Used 2.5 (1.91) (0, 4)

Important 2.00 (0.82) (1, 3)

Margin of Error 2.00 (0.82) (1, 3)

ABC Analysis 1.75 (0.50) (1, 2)

Pareto Principle 1.75 (0.96) (1, 3)

Parameter 1.25 (1.26) (0, 3)

Management 1.25 (1.89) (0, 4)

Inventory Systems 1.00 (2.00) (0, 4)

Natural 1.00 (0.82) (0, 2)

Distribution Value Analysis 0.75 (0.50) (0, 1)

20% 0.50 (0.58) (0, 1)

Miscellaneous 0.50 (1.00) (2, 2)

Table 4. Summary statistics for the total count of supply chain concept codes per poem.

Table 5 presents the total number of supply chain concepts codes for each poem in the second

column. Based on these totals, the average and the standard deviation for the total number of supply

chain concept codes for the sample can be calculated as shown. Using the sample average and

standard deviation, it is possible to quantify how many standard deviations the total supply chain

concept code count for a specific poem deviates from the average total count for the sample. This,

in turn, indicates how supply chain concept rich a poem is. Our results indicate that poem 114 was

the richest in supply chain content with a total count of 27, whereas poem 288 is the poorest with

a total count of 21. However, considering the fact that a standard “I am” poem is 16 lines long,

even the poorest poem includes more than one supply chain concept code per line.

Poem IDTotal Number of Supply

Chain Codes per PoemDeviation From Average

114 27 1.32

168 22 -0.57

186 24 0.19

288 21 -0.94

Average 23.5

Std. Dev. 2.6

Table 5. Total supply chain concept code counts per poem.

Table 5 shows how the supply chain concept code counts are distributed across the individual

poems in our sample. Based on this, it is interesting to see that although poem 114 is “richest” in

content based on our analysis in Table 5, this poem has repeated counts for Item Classification

code. Based on Table 6, poem 186 can be classified to be “comprehensive” than all others as it

captured all concepts other than Management and 20% excluding Miscellaneous whereas other

poems did not capture 3 or 4 concepts. Also, we can see that poem 288 was “unique,” so to say,

as it explored two concepts, which were categorized as Miscellaneous, that the other poems did

not explore.

Supply Chain Concept Code 114 168 186 288 Sum

Item Classification 7 4 4 2 17

System Improvement 3 0 3 5 11

Widely-Used 0 4 2 4 10

Important 3 2 2 1 8

Margin of error 1 2 2 3 8

ABC Analysis 2 2 2 1 7

Pareto Principle 2 3 1 1 7

Parameter 3 1 1 0 5

Management 0 0 4 1 5

Inventory System 4 0 0 0 4

Natural 0 2 1 1 4

Distribution Value Analysis 1 1 1 0 3

20% 1 1 0 0 2

Miscellaneous 0 0 0 2 2

Total 27 22 23 21 93

Table 6. Distribution of supply chain concept codes for each poem.

Table 7 shows the breakdown of the supply chain concept code composition for each verb. It

interesting to note that the verbs pretend and worry were used to capture the concept of Margin of

Error, i.e., the classification errors that can occur when ABC Analysis is used without considering

some important system characteristics that the modeling assumptions does not consider or

adequately capture. For instance, a mission critical item that is only used once during the

evaluation period can be classified as a Class C item, but based on the importance of the item for

the system, in fact, the item may have to be reclassified as a Class A or Class B item. Similarly,

the verb dream was used to capture System Improvement. The verb be was used to capture ABC

Analysis, which is not surprising due to the structure of the poem and also because the students

had to include an additional line at the end of the poem to communicate the supply chain concept

they decided to write their poem about. These observations suggest that verb choices may influence

the students’ selection of the supply chain concept to capture in their poems. The use of the verb

touch to refer to the wide usage of ABC analysis was a curious find.

Verb

Pa

ra

me

ter

Item

Cla

ssif

ica

tion

Imp

orta

nt

Dis

trib

uti

on

Va

lue

Ana

lysi

s

Ma

rgin

of

er

ro

r

AB

C A

na

lysi

s

Inv

ento

ry

Sy

ste

m

Sy

ste

m

Imp

ro

ve

me

nt

Pa

re

to

Pr

inc

iple

20

%

Wid

ely

-Use

d

Na

tura

l

Ma

na

ge

men

t

Pa

re

me

ter

Mis

ce

lla

ne

ou

s

Total

am 1 1 2 1 5

wonder 1 1 2 1 5

hear 1 1 2 4

see 2 2 4

want 2 1 1 1 5

am 1 1

pretend 2 1 3 1 7

feel 1 1 1 1 1 1 6

touch 1 1 1 3 1 1 8

worry 2 1 3 1 7

cry 2 1 1 1 5

understand 2 1 1 1 2 1 8

say 1 1 1 1 4

dream 1 3 1 1 1 7

try 1 1 2 1 1 6

hope 1 1 1 2 1 1 7

am 3 2 5

Total 5 17 8 3 8 7 4 11 7 2 10 4 5 1 2 94

Table 7. Distribution of supply chain concept codes according to the verbs of the poem lines.

Analysis of Emotions Reflected. Recall that if a poem line captured a complex emotion that could

not be adequately represented by one of the eight basic human emotions, this line could receive

more than one code. Consequently, the total number of emotion codes (95 in total) was more than

the total number of poem lines (65 in total) in the data set. Tables 8 and 9 provide an overview of

the total emotion code counts as well as the summary statistics, respectively. Table 8 indicates that

the emotions that were most reflected in the poem are trust and joy, both of which are positive

emotions. The next most popular emotion was anticipation, which can be a positive or a negative

emotion. Anger and surprise were the two emotions that were reflected the least. Similar

observations can be made by Table 9 based on the total number of emotion codes per poem.

Emotion

Code

Total Number of Emotion Codes

in the Entire Data Set

Percentage

(%)

Trust 24 25

Joy 21 22

Anticipation 19 20

Sadness 14 15

Disgust 6 6

Fear 6 6

Anger 3 3

Surprise 2 2

Total 9 100

Table 8. Total emotion code counts for over all four poems.

Emotion Code

Total Number of Emotion Codes per Poem

Average (Standard Deviation)

Range

(Minimum, Maximum)

Trust 6.00 (1.83) (4, 8)

Joy 5.25 (0.96) (4, 6)

Anticipation 4.75 (2.06) (2, 7)

Sadness 3.50 (1.00) (2, 4)

Disgust 1.50 (1.00) (1, 3)

Fear 1.50 (0.58) (1, 2)

Anger 0.75 (0.96) (0, 2)

Surprise 0.50 (1.00) (0, 2)

Table 9. Summary statistics for the total count of emotion codes per poem.

Table 10 shows how the emotion code counts are distributed across the individual poems in our

data set. Based on this, the data suggests that poem 186 is “richest” in emotional content with a

total of 25 emotion code count, although even poem 114, the “poorest” according to this metric,

had considerable emotional content with more than one emotion code per line. In our sample, poem

168 reflected all eight basic emotions, whereas poems 114 and 186 reflected only six.

Emotion Codes 114 168 186 288 Total

Trust 8 5 7 4 24

Joy 4 5 6 6 21

Anticipation 7 2 5 5 19

Sadness 2 4 4 4 14

Disgust 1 1 1 3 6

Fear 2 1 2 1 6

Anger 0 2 0 1 3

Surprise 0 2 0 0 2

Total 24 22 25 24 95

Table 10. Total count of emotion codes for each poem.

Table 11 shows the breakdown of the emotion code composition for each verb. It interesting to

note that the verbs pretend, cry, and worry were used to reflect disgust, sadness, and fear,

respectively, all of which are negative emotions. Similarly, the verbs dream and hope as well as

wonder and want were all used to reflect anticipation. While some instances of wonder reflected

the negative aspect of anticipation, all others reflected it positive aspect. Trust was reflected by

the verb be the most (a total of 8 times) as well as the verbs hear, see, and touch, which are

associated with one’s senses.

Verb / Emotion Trust Joy Anticipation Sadness Disgust Fear Anger Surprise Total

am 3 3 1 1 8

wonder 3 1 1 5

hear 2 1 1 4

see 3 1 4

want 2 3 2 7

am 1 1

pretend 4 4

feel 1 2 2 5

touch 3 3 6

worry 2 2 4 8

cry 4 1 2 7

understand 3 1 4

say 3 2 1 6

dream 3 4 1 8

try 1 1 2 2 6

hope 3 4 1 8

am 4 4

Total 24 21 19 14 6 6 3 2 95

Table 11. Distribution of emotion codes according to root verbs of the poem lines.

Additional Findings: Student Comments

Demographic Information. Of the four students, who wrote an “I am” poem on ABC Analysis for

the second assignment, three of them submitted their responses to the questionnaire. Based on this,

interestingly, all three students were Hispanic females.

Student Comments. At the end of the semester, students were asked to reflect on the applicability

and relevance of the poetry assignment in this course. Specifically, we asked “How can you see

this "I am" poem assignment being applicable and relevant in this course? The comments that we

received from the three students, who responded to the questionnaire are as follows:

“I will say that this poem is applicable and relevant to this cou(r)se, since I relate

this to a kind of 'supply chain'. In order to get the reader to understand what we

were talking about we were required, or at least I saw it this way, to do our best

explaining the concept so the reader could clearly understand what were talking

about and he or she feels satisfied with the different clues given in order to get to

the final line that clearly states what was the concept chosen. It should always be

in our interest to make our message, work, or service reach its final user or

destination in the best way so we make them things easier.”

Student 1

“It helped me understand myself and a complex topic a lot better. It also simplified

the topic in my head.”

Student 2

“The second "I AM" poem assignment allowed me to reflect back on a topic I

learned this semester and study it more deeply by looking at it in a different

perspective.”

Student 3

Note that there were no negative comments in this set of comments above. This is due to the fact

that, in this manuscript, we focused on a subset of four poems on ABC Analysis. In the complete

data set of all student responses, there are a few comments that express some student resistance

against the use of poetry in an upper level engineering class. We will be presenting those findings

in another manuscript.

Concluding Remarks

Enhancement of the creative capacities and communication skills of engineering students critically

relate to the development of the so-called 21st Century Skill. To this end, we incorporated poetry-

writing assignments into a required upper-level course in industrial and systems engineering

curriculum. Data was collected from two sections of the course taught in Spring 2020. In this

paper, we present our preliminary results obtained from the analysis of a subset of four poems that

focused on ABC Analysis. Our preliminary results based on this data set suggest that root verbs in

the poetic structure may have an influence on the tone of language used and emotions reflected.

Also, based on this data set, it is possible to observe that the poems are rich in technical content,

allowing for the communication of technical concepts in plain language. More importantly, student

feedback highlights the value of the assignment as it relates to the development of their

communication skills. Surprisingly, student feedback also indicated that the poetry assignment, in

fact, enhanced their understanding of the technical content, enhancing their understanding of a

complex topic. We will continue to analyze poems on other inventory and supply chain related

topics. Furthermore, we will be using these preliminary insights to develop poetry-based

supplemental educational material for the course and investigate their impact on learning outcomes

using experimental design.

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by a University of Florida Creative Campus Grant and The Cottmeyer

Family Innovative Frontiers Faculty Fellowship of the first author through the Herbert Wertheim

College of Engineering and the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the

University of Florida.

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