Response strategies for curriculum change in engineering

Abstract

During the last 25 years, there have been many calls for new engineering competencies and a corresponding gradual change in both curriculum and pedagogy in engineering education. This has been a global trend, in the US, Europe, Australia and now emerging in the rest of the world. Basically, there have been two main types of societal challenges that many engineering institutions have responded to: the employability skills of graduates and the need for a sustainability approach to engineering. These are two very different challenges and societal needs; however, the ways engineering institutions have responded form a consistent pattern across many of the content aspects. No matter the specific character of change, three very different curriculum strategies seem to have evolved: an add-on strategy, an integration strategy or a re-building strategy; the latter involves substantial curriculum re-design. The add-on strategy and integration strategy are the ones most commonly used, whereas the re-building strategy is at an emerging stage in most engineering education communities. Most engineering schools find it very challenging to re-build an entire curriculum, so smaller changes are generally preferred. The purpose of this article is to conceptualise these institutional response strategies in a wider literature and present examples of curriculum change within both employability and sustainability. We will maintain that all these strategies are based on management decisions as well as academic faculty decisions; however the implications for using the various strategies are very different in terms of system change, role of disciplines, leader interventions and faculty development strategies. Furthermore, institutions might use all types of response strategies in different programs and in different semesters. The conceptual framework presented here can provide analytical anchors, hopefully creating more awareness of the complexity of systemic change.

Competences of graduation for the curricular redesign of mechanical engineering based on local and national development agendas

“…It seeks the solution of real problems applied to local and national development agendas that contribute to the traceability of curriculum design goals in the country [21]. These are considered the basis of "know-what" structure to define graduate competences, basic competences and specific competences [22]. The next step in the methodology synthesizes the reports of employability and follow-up to graduates, identifying the soft skills and labor competencies that should be developed in the new engineering professionals.…”

Project-Based Learning through Information and Communications Technology and the Curricular Inclusion of Social Problems Relevant to the Initial Training of Infant School Teachers

“…As an add-on strategy [56] to the study plan of the Degree in Infant Education (Infant School Teacher) and a project approach by disciplines, the trainee teacher responsible for the study module presented the problematic social issues during the first teaching sessions, with which they would have to work for 51 practice hours. Each issue, centered on real life, is described as a structural axis upon which to define the problem around the pluralist construction of cultural identities, social inequality (among which, those of gender), and economics, sustainability, poverty, armed conflict, and the defense of Human Rights.…”

Propuesta para el despliegue de competencias genéricas y su integración con el diseño de actividades de Aprendizaje Basado en Proyectos : caso de las ingenierías del software y computadores

“…Kolmos [60] define tres niveles de implementación del ABPm y ABPt dentro de un curriculum de acuerdo a su alcance: The add-on strategy, the integration strategy y the re-building strategy.…”

“…-Se puede aplicar a varios tipos de implementación de ABPt Hemos utilizado el término "actividad ABPt" ya que el método se puede aplicar no sólo a las asignaturas individuales, sino también a actividades multidisciplinares más allá de los límites de una sola materia. Por lo tanto, puede ser utilizado en las dos primeras estrategias definidas en Kolmos [60], las estrategias de Add-on e Integration. Además, creemos que el método podría contribuir de manera indirecta para lograr la estrategia de Re-building, ya que puede ayudar a cambiar la visión educativa de los profesores, aunque esta estrategia requiere cambios estructurales mucho más profundos.…”

“…En concreto analizaremos dos. El primero, propuesto por Kolmos[60] describe tres niveles para la implantación del ABPm y el ABPt desde el punto de vista del impacto académico que alcanzan las metodologías. En la misma línea, Maggie Savin-Baden [61] describe 7 modos de organizar la metodología de ABP en un curriculum.…”