In an era of unprecedented technological advancement, engineering practice continues to evolve but engineering education has not changed appreciably since the 1950s. This schism has prompted industry, government, and other key constituents to question the relevancy and efficacy of current programs. The Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) Engineering Criteria 2000, which will be fully implemented in 2001, emphasizes outcomes over process, and provides an opportunity for stakeholders to help universities define educational goals and objectives and design a curriculum to meet the desired outcomes .1 While the need for curriculum reform has been acknowledged, the "industry position" was amorphous and anecdotal and therefore difficult to address. Qualitative methodologies such as formal surveys and structured interviews can be used to capture and quantify industry expectations of the needed attributes (i.e., knowledge, skills, and experience) for entry level engineering employees. Such instruments can provide key data useful in determining objectives and designing curricula to attain those objectives. This paper presents results of a formal survey of fifteen aerospace and defense companies concerning the perceived importance of 172 attributes related to the eleven ABET Program Outcomes and Assessment categories. The survey, resulting database, and preliminary analyses are available in hard copy and electronic form. This is the first formal survey and database resulting from efforts of the Industry-University-Government Roundtable for Enhancing Engineering Education (IUGREEE) to initiate a continuing, evolving process to provide curriculum designers with important information from industry.
This paper is a continuation of the author’s previous examinations of a suite of issues surrounding the putative decline in aerospace (and aeronautics in particular) conducted under the auspices of the American institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). The purpose of this paper is to use recent aerospace industry experience as a lens for examining four specific issues believed to be of broader importance to the future of our industry and others as well. The first is the question of how many engineers we may need in our future as we confront the problem of an aging workforce and the globalization of our industry. The second is the question of what skills and abilities these engineers will need to possess as the overall industry continues to evolve. Third is the pervasive need for more systems-oriented, multidisciplinary-skilled talent. Finally, the issue of what academe needs to do to support the development of a future generation of engineering talent is addressed. A basic message of this paper, carried on from earlier writings, is that while aerospace may indeed be a “maturing industry” (at least in some major traditional product areas), there is much that we can and should do to create a vision of our future as vivid as that which has driven our past as a means to attract, educate and develop the talent needed to assure the future of our enterprise. Without this talent, few of the major technological advances that can be currently foreseen can come to fruition.
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