Engineering Education

This is an exerpt from a paper I wrote about contemporary issues in engineering. The issue is engineering education methods. 

The culture of engineering education dictates who enters the engineering profession. The majority of engineering curriculums are narrow and do not produce well-rounded individuals. Engineers must be programmers, technicians, technical writers and financial analysts. But at the same time, engineers inherently serve within the context of society. “Many students fail to turn up to classes because they ultimately become dissatisfied with the style of the lectures, strongly suggesting that the students fail to see the relevance of attendance and, at times, the relevance of the topic being taught.”(Riemer, 2002)

Students are taught to follow the rules rather than take risks or innovate. Certainly students need to learn the rules before they can make informed choices about breaking them, but only rarely do we get to examine case studies of innovative design. “The heavy traditionalism of many courses have the perspective of teaching only real engineering, i.e. defining and isolating problems and achieving technical solutions.” (Riemer, 2002) What about considering the social, economic and political impacts of these technical designs?

           

Engineering professors are frequently guilty of assuming that all engineering students come into the program with the same strengths and weakness, the same thought processes. We do not. I crave verbal definitions of technical terms and I need to know why things work the way they do in order to understand new concepts. Many of my classmates don’t. They want equations and formulas. There is this faith in numbers I don’t understand. Engineering professors often do not recognize the benefits of explaining things in multiple ways or do not deem it important enough to bother. Just because you say the same words in a different order does not mean that explanation was sufficient. The how and why of technical concepts must be addressed, “those skills need to be utilised across the degree to demonstrate application and reinforce behaviour.” (Riemer, 2002) 

For my engineering education, I addressed this issue by staying. I seriously considered leaving the Environmental Resources Engineering department and SUNY ESF my sophomore year of college. Math and physics had always been my weakest subjects in high school. By my third semester of college, I had had enough uninspired professors and gnashed my teeth through enough problem sets to be worn out. I was working very hard and felt like I wasn’t making any progress. 

 

Stew Diemont, my academic advisor, convinced me not to leave. I explained to him that I was having a rough semester and would rather be studying something else. In high school I had taken three times the number of foreign language credits necessary to graduate, I wanted to study something with languages. He told me that I could find the French in physics and I was an asset to THE PROFESSION because I didn’t operate like everybody else. Apparently I’m not the only one who wishes for more outside of engineering, “female participation is increasing at a much greater rate when engineering is coupled with another discipline as part of a double degree. The benefits of a double degree is that the student’s skills base is augmented in other areas, including communication” (Riemer, 2002) Stew flattered me into staying, but I didn’t really believe him until later.

For a long time I didn’t think I could do it. I didn’t think I would graduate with a degree in engineering because I wasn’t smart enough. After sticking through it this far, I know I am capable of whatever my professors throw at me. My schooling is up to me; I demand that the material be explained to me until my TAs and professors are blue in the face. They seem alternately irritated and impressed.

Beyond figuring out what works best for me, I’m not sure that I can have an effect on how engineers are educated. Academic institutions are slow to change and very hierarchical. They don’t want undergrads telling them that they are doing it all wrong. In fact, for many of my classmates, I’m sure this is what they prefer. If engineering departments want to attract and retain more diverse student bodies; they must broaden their curriculums and acknowledge other learning styles.