Page 134 - Educating the Engineer of 2020: Adapting Engineering Education to the New Century

Educating the Engineer of 2020: Adapting Engineering Education to the New Century
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/11338.html

HISTORY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION REFORM 117

education—the Wickenden report of the 1920s—also called for less
hands-on specialization and more general preparation in math and sci-
ence (Wickenden, 1927).
The change in emphasis gained momentum after European engi-
neers who arrived here after 1920 demonstrated the practical utility of
mathematics in modern engineering sciences applied to practical prob-
lems, such as vibration and dynamic movement in machinery, the
strength of materials, fluid dynamics in aviation and maritime engi-
neering, and stresses in pavement slabs and dams. Even so, it wasn’t
until the 1950s, when the Grinter report (1956) again emphasized such
knowledge and the federal government decided to fund fundamental
research (as opposed to “applied” research) and unleashed an avalanche
of money for university programs, that American engineering schools
almost universally adopted engineering science as the core of engineer-
ing education.
The far-reaching ramifications of this change included the first sig-
nificant focus on graduate education in engineering schools—especially
at the Ph.D. level. Research programs, which had always been small and
oriented more toward preparing students to understand research than
toward generating new knowledge, assumed substantially more impor-
tance in the eyes of college and university administrators. Until this
time, engineering faculty members were expected to have experience in
the real world—usually in industry.
The new emphasis on federally funded research (more than 70 per-
cent of university research was funded by the government) severed the
tight linkage between engineering faculty and business corporations.
The change was so complete that by the late 1960s practicing engineers
were complaining that the pendulum had swung too far toward theo-
retical concerns, that engineering graduates lacked problem-solving ca-
pabilities, and that engineering faculty and practicing engineers spoke
entirely different languages. Pressure began to build to redress the bal-
ance and restore design to engineering curricula and to rebuild ties be-
tween business and industry and engineering faculty. At the same time,
the federal share of research funding declined or at least held steady
(depending on the field) from the 1970s onward. In the 1990s, engi-
neering curricula underwent major changes driven by the accreditation
process overseen by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Tech-
nology (ABET), with substantial support from American industry

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