Technological innovation and engineering education: Beware the da Vinci requirement

• Autores: David M Bowen
• Localización: The International journal of engineering education, ISSN-e 0949-149X, Vol. 29, no. 1, 2013, págs. 77-84
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • How best can one educate the engineer of 2020 and beyond? How can institutions meet increasing demands to producegraduates with sound scientific fundamentals and essential non-technical skills, while ensuring they are knowledgeable ofstate of the art advances in technology? To better frame the discussion, I present an analysis of historical technicalinnovation and engineering knowledge trends, and provide a perspective on the practice of parsing technologicalknowledge to define new engineering disciplines. Evidence suggests that the emergence of new engineering disciplineshas historically matched the pace of increases in technological innovations, with both the number of disciplines andtechnological innovation doubling at a rate of between 31 and 35 years. Continued success of the parsing strategy requiresincreased emphasis on certain engineering education trends such as instilling communication and teaming skills, anemphasis on life-long learning skills, and mechanisms for interdisciplinary integration. Lastly, I recommend that aproactive and thoughtful mapping of future disciplinary demarcations could prove more beneficial than the current ad hocprocess.