Estimating the Artificial Intelligence Learning Efficiency for Civil Engineer Education: A Case Study in Taiwan

The civil engineering educators focused on implementing interdisciplinary learning in artificial intelligence (AI) based on a more innovative application of construction requirements. However, only a few pieces of literature discussed the educational learning efficiency and feedback for this trend. Hence, this study surveyed the 237 data from eight universities that issued the interdisciplinary courses. The factors were modified from the scales in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education. Further, the descriptive analysis was used to explain this situation in Taiwan. A novel approach based on data envelopment analysis and Mahalanobis distance approaches was proposed to solve this problem. The advantages of the proposed approach were discussed and compared with traditional method. Based on the student gains in the interdisciplinary courses, three groups were clustered and compared. The feedback of a high-input and low-efficiency student group was suggested for improving learning strategies. The sensitivity analysis of this special group showed that effective teaching practice is the key factor in the artificial intelligence courses for civil engineering students. These students may increase technical efficiency by 37% by paying 21% inputs. Therefore, this paper provided a useful and easy approach to make learning strategies for non-informatics students in AI learning.