Page 126 - Standards for K-12 Engineering Education

Standards for K-12 Engineering Education?

APPENDIX B 111

enable a coherent, conceptually rich, standards-based curriculum to emerge. Engineering is
st
positioned to lead in the design of this radical 21 century reform.
9

So Here We Go

My idea is that the engineering community not only work toward increasing its presence in the
schools, but that it do so in a way that provides the nation with the capacity to create curricula
st
st
that respond to 21 -century needs in a 21 -century way.

Step 1. Establish an independent education center dedicated to providing the ideas and
st
leadership necessary to design and oversee the installation of a 21 -century curricular
structure and to foster the meaningful presence of engineering in school curricula. The
board, affiliates, and panels of this education center would include representatives of industrial
and academic engineering, education policy makers, administrators, and teachers, and university
facility. The following steps will proceed pretty much in parallel.
10

Step 2. Conceptualize a design (including specifications) for a new publication,
Engineering for All Americans. The purpose of this publication would be to tell the engineering
education story in a captivating way for educators and citizens and to provide a conceptual base
for other resources to follow. Science for All Americans might well serve as a model. The
11
design concept would be used to seek funding, and if successful, the project would proceed.

Step 3. Create design specifications (i.e., standards) for Engineering Context Teaching
Modules. The purpose of these modules would be to help teachers teach their current subjects,
not engineering. Develop a few samples. Encourage teachers and engineers to create additional
examples following the given design standards. Resources for Science Literacy, developed by the
Environmental Literacy Council and the National Science Teachers Association, can serve as a
12
model. The creation of standards would increase the presence of engineering in the schools in a
positive way and, therefore, would not be seen as an effort to displace current subjects.

Step 4. Establish a capacity for systematically reviewing engineering education
instructional materials (print and Internet) for accuracy and for relevance to K–12
education. As an organization, the Environmental Literacy Council, which started out reviewing
instructional materials, found that authors and publishers often responded by making changes in
the content. The process of reaching agreement on review criteria would necessarily lead to
decisions related to standards.

Step 5. Create standards for “curriculum blocks.” Middle school and high school courses
th
and elementary school subjects were the building blocks of 20 century school curricula. At
some point in this century, the building blocks will become much more varied, will reflect much

9 Design, after all, is the business of engineering.
10 I realize that this could be politically difficult, but in the absence of the equivalent of an AAAS, a
consortium of some sort will be needed.
11 www.project2061.org
12
www.envirolit.org

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