Using Human-Centered Design to Connect Engineering Concepts to Sustainable Development Goals

Abstract

Background. Engineering design is widely recognized as a field that can generate key innovations for complex problems, such as those elucidated in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). However, engineering design training is not widely accessible to the global community, particularly to people experiencing the challenges that the SDGs are striving to address. Purpose. This manuscript describes the Ignite program created by the Center for Global Women's Health Technologies (GWHT) at Duke University, which uses the human-centered design framework to apply engineering design concepts to address specific challenges associated with the SDGs. Design/Method. Undergraduate students participate in a design course (BME 290) to learn how to create and deliver a technological solution to increase access to light at night, which is a significant challenge in many communities around the globe. A subset of the undergraduate students partnered with an energy-poor community in which they implemented a curriculum based on the skills learned in BME 290. Results. Since 2014, 110 Duke students have taken BME 290, and 22 of those students traveled internationally, collectively teaching 275 students in Kenya, India, and Guatemala. Students in Kenya 2 SUMMER 2020 VOLUME 8 ISSUE 2 ADVANCES IN ENGINEERING EDUCATION Using Human-Centered Design to Connect Engineering Concepts to Sustainable Development Goals formed an engineering club and taught the curriculum to an additional 52 peers. Duke students also trained 15 other university students, both in the United States and Guatemala, who have taught the curriculum to an additional 150 students in Guatemala, which illustrates the scalability and sustainability of the curriculum across countries, communities, and cultures. Conclusions. By integrating human-centered design and the SDGs into engineering curricula and targeting communities that work with women and girls, we believe the Ignite program can impact three of the SDGs-renewable energy, quality education, and gender equality.

Intradisciplinary Growth of Sustainability-Minded Engineers through Conservation Technology

“…In conservation biology, human-wildlife conflict is a prevalent challenge, with examples ranging from humans invading animals' native habitats to disease transmission of urban wildlife such as coyotes, foxes, and monkeys in dense urban areas. The onboarding modules are: The introduction of Human-centered design is grounded in the IDEO framework discussed in the project-based engineering education setting by Mueller et al [42]. We discuss and introduce the United Nation's sustainable development goals framework as a prompt for later assessments discussed in the design phase.…”

Systems engineering applied to urban planning and development: A review and research agenda

“…Other recent approaches focus on scenario planning and education for understanding evolution of the urban form, 156 sustainable landuse planning that relies upon multilevel stakeholder partnerships, 157 a synthesis of participatory planning with systems engineering for sustainable regional planning, 158 and leveraging human-centered design to address the SDGs. 159 Common across all of these methods emphasize significant consideration of a wide set of stakeholders and then adopt different systems engineering techniques for integrating these stakeholder needs into the system design and development process. While none are fully developed or widely adopted, they are evidence of an active interest in applying systems engineering to sustainable development while avoiding the pitfalls of the past.…”

“…Other recent approaches focus on scenario planning and education for understanding evolution of the urban form, 156 sustainable land‐use planning that relies upon multilevel stakeholder partnerships, 157 a synthesis of participatory planning with systems engineering for sustainable regional planning, 158 and leveraging human‐centered design to address the SDGs 159 …”

Increasing Contextualized Social Awareness through Multidisciplinary Teams in Global Service-Learning Projects

“…This is echoed by other researchers who affirm that these skills are not innate but must be intentionally integrated into the curriculum for students to practice engineering from these perspectives [9, 11, 13 -16]. While humanitarian projects for engineers, such as the work with Engineers Without Borders, Engineers in Action and other project-based learning applications have shown themselves to be effective in increasing awareness of cultural dimensions and skills of communication and teamwork [6,7,11,18,19], to achieve user-centered systems, a formalized approach is required. While all engineering disciplines may use their technical areas of expertise in engineering projects benefiting society, it is the field of Human Factors Engineering or Human Systems Engineering that is the technical discipline focused on the intersection of human focused work and technical systems [21].…”

“…While all engineering disciplines may use their technical areas of expertise in engineering projects benefiting society, it is the field of Human Factors Engineering or Human Systems Engineering that is the technical discipline focused on the intersection of human focused work and technical systems [21]. This intersection is described numerous ways; however, user-centered design is one of the predominate terms within the discipline of Human Systems Engineering that center on cultural, societal, environmental, and ethical as cornerstones for engineering design [9,14,16,18,[20][21][22]. It has been shown that without intentionality in program design, humanitarian engineering projects can disenfranchise the very communities they are trying to help [23].…”