Are we doing our homework? An analysis of food engineering education in Brazil

Abstract

What is the profile of Food Engineering education in Brazil? Are we following the contemporary professional renewal trend? Driven by these questions, the present study analyzed data regarding 21 academic courses,which represent approximately 22% of the total bachelor’s degree in food engineering courses offered in the country. Samples were defined considering a Brazilian annual ranking of undergraduate programs: very good (four stars) and excellent (five stars). Next, information was recovered from both the Brazilian Ministry of Education and institutional homepages of each analyzed program. The results suggest that food engineering programs exhibit relative identity, naturally due to their history and the path of each program and their faculty, shaping particularities in how fields of knowledge are constituted, in addition to their representativeness in the total workload of the program. However, initial analysis is suggestive regarding understanding that Brazil is not properly doing its homework, based on global movement, concerning food engineering education. The need to rethink Brazilian technical education, without culminating in additional workload, is emphasized, not only regarding new materials and technologies for learning and teaching, but also in terms of bringing a human and market approach. The achievement of this complex goal seems to be provided by the encouragement of student associations, transversal learning processes, and learning experiences outside the classroom as a means of improving undergraduate programs and human resources.

Teaching Engineering and Food: From Traditional Approaches to a Flipped Course on Gastronomic Engineering

“…The ISEKI database on academic curricula lists 34 BSc, 14 MSc, and 4 PhD programs in Europe whose names explicitly refer to "food engineering" or "agrifood engineering" (https ://www.iseki -food.net/curri cula?title = food+engin eerin g&field _curr_degre e_value =All&count ry= All)By the year 2000, Latin American universities boasted over 100 undergraduate programs in FE, but this information is not updated [37]. Brazil alone reports 96 undergraduate bachelor degree programs in FE, equivalent to 7000 admissions per year [38]. There are at least 50 Departments of Food Engineering in Turkey that graduate around 1000 students per year [39].…”