Holistic Engineering Education

Holistic Engineering Education: Beyond Technology is a compilation of coordinated and focused essays from world leaders in the engineering profession who are dedicated to a transformation of engineering education and practice. The contributors define a new and holistic approach to education and practice that captures the creativity, interdisciplinarity, complexity, and adaptability required for the profession to grow and truly serve global needs. With few exceptions today, engineering students and professionals continue to receive a traditional, technically-based education and training using curriculum models developed for early 20th century manufacturing and machining. While this educational paradigm has served engineering well, helping engineers create awe-inspiring machines and technologies for society, the coursework and expectations of most engineering programs eschew breadth and intellectual exploration to focus on consistent technological precision and study. Why this dichotomy?

While engineering will always need precise technological skill, the 21st century innovation economy demands a new professional perspective that recognizes the value of complex systems thinking, cross-disciplinary collaborations, economic and environmental impacts (sustainability), and effective communication to global and community leaders, thus enabling engineers to consider "the whole patient" of society’s needs. The goal of this book is to inspire, lead, and guide this critically needed transformation of engineering education.

"Holistic Engineering Education: Beyond Technology points the way to a transformation of engineering education and practice that will be sufficiently robust, flexible, and systems-oriented to meet the grand challenges of the 21^st century with their ever-increasing scale, complexity, and transdisciplinary nature."

-- Charles Vest, President, National Academy of Engineering; President Emeritus, MIT

"This collection of essays provides compelling arguments for the need of an engineering education that prepares engineers for the problems of the 21^st century. Following the National Academy’s report on the Engineer of 2020, this book brings together experts who make the case for an engineering profession that looks beyond developing just cool technologies and more into creating solutions that can address important problems to benefit real people."

-- Linda Katehi, Chancellor, University of California at Davis

"This superb volume offers a provocative portrait of the exciting future of engineering education...A dramatically new form of engineering education is needed that recognizes this field as a liberal art, as a profession that combines equal parts technical rigor and creative design...The authors challenge the next generation to engineering educators to imagine, think and act in new ways. "  

-- Lee S. Shulman, President Emeritus, The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education Emeritus, Stanford University

Holistic Engineering Education: Beyond Technology is a compilation of coordinated and focused essays from world leaders in the engineering profession who are dedicated to a transformation of engineering education and practice. The contributors define a new and holistic approach to education and practice that captures the creativity, interdisciplinarity, complexity, and adaptability required for the profession to grow and truly serve global needs. With few exceptions today, engineering students and professionals continue to receive a traditional, technically-based education and training using curriculum models developed for early 20th century manufacturing and machining. While this educational paradigm has served engineering well, helping engineers create awe-inspiring machines and technologies for society, the coursework and expectations of most engineering programs eschew breadth and intellectual exploration to focus on consistent technological precision and study. Why this dichotomy?

While engineering will always need precise technological skill, the 21st century innovation economy demands a new professional perspective that recognizes the value of complex systems thinking, cross-disciplinary collaborations, economic and environmental impacts (sustainability), and effective communication to global and community leaders, thus enabling engineers to consider "the whole patient" of society's needs. The goal of this book is to inspire, lead, and guide this critically needed transformation of engineering education.

"Holistic Engineering Education: Beyond Technology points the way to a transformation of engineering education and practice that will be sufficiently robust, flexible, and systems-oriented to meet the grand challenges of the 21^st century with their ever-increasing scale, complexity, and transdisciplinary nature."

-- Charles Vest, President, National Academy of Engineering; President Emeritus, MIT

"This collection of essays provides compelling arguments for the need of an engineering education that prepares engineers for the problems of the 21^st century. Following the National Academy s report on the Engineer of 2020, this book brings together experts who make the case for an engineering profession that looks beyond developing just cool technologies and more into creating solutions that can address important problems to benefit real people."

-- Linda Katehi, Chancellor, University of California at Davis

"This superb volume offers a provocative portrait of the exciting future of engineering education A dramatically new form of engineering education is needed that recognizes this field as a liberal art, as a profession that combines equal parts technical rigor and creative design The authors challenge the next generation to engineering educators to imagine, think and act in new ways. "  

-- Lee S. Shulman, President Emeritus, The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education Emeritus, Stanford University

Contributors:

Wanda Austin, President and CEO, The Aerospace Corporation, and Adjunct Faculty, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA

Dennis D. Berkey, President, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, MA,USA

Melody Brown Burkins, Senior Director of Research and Strategic Initiatives,The University of Vermont, Burlington, VT, USA

Richard J. Byrne, Vice President, The MITRE Corporation, Bedford, MA, USA

Carol T. Christ, President, Smith College, Northampton, MA, USA

Nicholas Donofrio, Executive Vice President Emeritus and Fellow, IBMInnovation and Technology, Armonk, NY, USA

James J. Duderstadt, President Emeritus and University Professor of Science and Engineering, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

Marie Francesca, Director, Corporate Engineering Operations, The MITRECorporation, Bedford, MA, USA

Hector Gallegos, President, Peruvian College of Engineering and Professor,Pontificia Universidad Católica, Lima, Perú

David E. Goldberg, Jerry S. Dobrovolny Distinguished Professor, Co-Director,Illinois Foundry for Innovation in Engineering Education (iFoundry), and Director, Illinois Genetic Algorithms Laboratory, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA

Mark Goodman, Director, Strategic Planning, The Aerospace Corporation, Los Angeles, CA, USA

Domenico Grasso, Vice President for Research and Dean of the Graduate College,The University of Vermont, Burlington, VT, USA

Alfred Grasso, President and CEO, The MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA, USA

Priscilla Guthrie, Associate Director of National Intelligence and IntelligenceCommunity Chief Information Officer, Office of Director of National Intelligence, Washington, DC, USA

Joseph J. Helble, Dean and Professor, Thayer School of Engineering, DartmouthCollege, Hanover, NH, USA

Stephen D. Huffman, Vice President and CTO, The MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA, USA

Catherine P. Koshland, Vice Provost, Academic Planning & Facilities andWood-Calvert Professor in Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, CA,USA

John M. Kreger, Chief Systems Engineer, The MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA, USA

David Martinelli, Professor, Department of Civil and EnvironmentalEngineering, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, USA

Louis S. Metzger, Senior Vice President and Corporate Chief Engineer, TheMITRE Corporation, McLean, VA, USA

Ioannis Miaoulis, President and Director, Museum of Science, Boston, MA, USA

M. Granger Morgan, Professor and Head, Department of Engineering and PublicPolicy, Carnegie-Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

Calline Sanchez, Director of IBM Systems Storage Development, IBMInnovation and Technology, Armonk, NY, USA

Jim Spohrer, Director, Almaden Services Research, Almaden Research Center, IBM Research, San Jose, San Jose, CA, USA

Charles Tang, Principal Engineer/Scientist, The Aerospace Corporation, and Adjunct Faculty, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA

Marilee Wheaton, General Manager, Systems Engineering Division, The Aerospace Corporation, University of Southern California, and Adjunct Faculty,Los Angeles, CA, USA

Suzette Williamson, Executive Director, The Institute for Management andEngineering (TiME), Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, USA

Charla K. Wise, Vice President, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Bethesda, MD, USA

Gary E. Wnek, Faculty Director and Joseph F. Toot, Jr., Professor of Engineering,The Institute for Management and Engineering (TiME), Case Western ReserveUniversity, Cleveland, OH, USA

Pan Yunhe, Executive Vice President, Chinese Academy of Engineering and President Emeritus, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China