Resumen de Transdisciplinarity for sustainability in engineering education
This research aims to improve engineering education in sustainability (EESD) through transdisciplinarity (td) learning approaches. The research comprised 3 phases. The first consisted of the analysis of how sustainability is approached in EE through a co-word analysis and characterization of the keywords networks of three relevant journals in the field of EESD over two decades. The journal networks evolution analysis suggested that the concern was growing to move to society. Td and related keywords constantly dripped along the ten years in all the journals and gained relevance, especially in International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education (IJSHE) and Journal of Cleaner Production (JCLP). Additionally the IJSHE showed a will of reinforcing relationships beyond the university; the International Journal of Engineering Education (IJEE) gave relevance to real case studies with a North-South component and to students’ representativeness; and the JCLP contributed aspects on competences and educational strategies. The characterisation brought as relevant categories towards sustainability those related to cross-boundary schemes (i.e. td, ethics, networking), institutional aspects, faculty professional development training and learning strategies. Finally, keywords related to td and collaborative networking spread throughout all the areas of knowledge addressed by the journals, indicating a widening interest.
The second phase studied how emergent EESD initiatives were approached from td as valued competence for sustainability. The research indicated that most of the initiatives fitted in the problem solving discourse, where co-production of knowledge and method-driven aspects are relevant. Deepening this discourse, most initiatives corresponded to the real-world argument promoting science-society collaboration to solve societal problems (EU contexts); others looked for convergence of all sciences (life, human, physical and engineering) in pursuit of human well-being (innovation argument, US contexts); and some initiatives brought together students and entities in a team-based learning process with social purpose (transcendent interdisciplinary research “tir” argument). It is noteworthy that none of the initiatives mirrored the transgression discourse, which attempts to reformulate the establishment, no longer for society but with society.
The last phase consisted in the implementation of a td learning environment experience in the course Action Research Workshop on Science and Technology (Sci&Tech) for Sustainability (5 ETCS) of the UPC Master degree in Sustainability Sci&Tech. Civil organisations, public administration, students and educators undertook collaborative research on real-life sustainability case studies, following two cycles of action-reflection. While the course mainly fitted in the real-world argument of problem solving, service learning (SL) or CampusLab schemes also reproduced a team-based learning with societal purpose (“tir” argument). We addressed the transgression discourse by means of SL focusing on social justice, which enhanced the development of complex thinking. Afterwards, some students engaged as professional researchers-activists in the participant organisations. Challenges of their learning process were: problem formulation, process uncertainty, stakeholder’s interests and roles integration, and interpersonal skills. Additionally, a well-valued Emotional Intelligence module was developed by the author to help students face some process paralyzing uncertainties.
Finally this work proposes a set of fundamental features to be considered for an effective scheme for a td approach in EESD, methodically framing the science-society discourse on the issue at stake: work in real-world complex problems; involve diverse disciplines and fields cooperation; involve science-society cooperation and mutual learning processes; integrate types of knowledge; rely on disciplinary and cross-disciplinary practice.
