ERIC Number: EJ919087
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2011-Apr
Pages: 10
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0270-4676
EISSN: N/A
Adaptive Engineering
VanderSteen, Jonathan
Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society, v31 n2 p134-143 Apr 2011
Engineers today cannot meet their professional obligation to the welfare of society if they do not have a broad, multidisciplinary vision, and yet a multidisciplinary vision is becoming enormously difficult to obtain. A new curriculum must emerge that can integrate a focused, discipline-based scientific approach with an integrated approach. To do this, we must recognize that there is already a structure that is deeply embedded into the current pedagogy, which values performance ratios such as efficiency as paramount. Current trends indicate a call for a broader, reflexive, and preventative curriculum, but like many other calls for change, these will fail if the focus continues to be on wrong values. A model for an adaptive engineering curriculum is developed that strives to maintain a scientific approach as well as a broad "culture-based approach." A new way of thinking about engineering curriculum must involve a "resymbolization" in which experience, context, community, and certain nonmeasurable principles are valued.
Descriptors: Engineering, Role, Professional Occupations, Interdisciplinary Approach, Engineering Education, Curriculum Development, Models, Influence of Technology, Social Change, Context Effect, Scientific Literacy, Cultural Influences, Integrated Curriculum, Educational Change, Attitude Change, Science and Society
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: Higher Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A