Page 163 - 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

Capturing the Imagination:
High-Priority Reforms for

Engineering Educators

Gretchen Kalonji
University of Washington

My remarks are based on lessons learned in recent years, particu-
larly through the National Science Foundation (NSF) Engineering Edu-
cation Coalitions, but also through other notable efforts to reform sci-
ence education at both the university and K-12 levels. A great many
projects have been undertaken, and we have accumulated quite a bit of
data about what works well and what doesn’t. There have been many
successful innovations that can help us in planning for the future: the
benefits of interdisciplinary, team-based design activities early in the
curriculum; the power of novel linkages with K-12 programs and stu-
dent leadership activities; the importance of the innovative integration
of technology (particularly when students are involved in its design and
implementation); the importance of alternative approaches to assessing
student learning; the need for programs for graduate student and fac-
ulty development; and the implications of all of these for diversity in
our communities.
Even if we could scale up what works in the intellectual and profes-
sional development of students and in increasing diversity in the engi-
neering workforce, we would still not be able to address the problems
we face nationally in engineering education. That is because most of the
work up to now has been performed in the framework of perceived and/
or real constraints, focused mostly on the curriculum, particularly the
transformation of courses creatively about the kind of activities that
promote the intellectual and professional development of students, we

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