How Diverse Are Global Perspectives On Diversity, Equity, And Inclusion In Engineering Education?

The SEFI Special Interest Group on Gender & Diversity has recently been renamed as Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, broadening the definition from a focus on gender to embrace a wider range of diverse identities – such as language and cultural background, religion, physical ability, and socioeconomic status – and to promote and support equity and inclusive practices within SEFI and beyond. In the process of redefining the Special Interest Group’s mission, it has become clear that definitions of diversity, equity and inclusion may vary considerably between different contexts and institutions. Therefore, it is relevant for the engineering education community to share and examine how these terms are understood and implemented in their own institution and in other contexts around the globe. In this workshop, invited panelists from different continents and countries (United Kingdom, United States of America, Venezuela, South Africa, People’s Republic of China), and representing different engineering education communities across the globe (SEFI, American Society for Engineering Education, Research in Engineering Education Network, South African Society for Engineering Education) presented their perspectives and experiences on diversity, equity and inclusion. This was followed by small group discussions, during which SEFI 2023 participants examined their personal and the panelists’ perspectives with the facilitators. Several main conclusions emerged from these exchanges, all imbued with the awareness that context is crucial and that sustained dialogue with stakeholders across cultures and continents through various channels within and beyond the Special Interest Group of SEFI should be supported

Developing Global Engineers- A Comparison Between Scotland, Usa And Chile

Engineering-accredited programmes are reviewed every 4-5 years by professional bodies with the aim of assuring standards that guarantee that graduate engineers can fulfil the highest technical demands of the industry workforce in order to achieve a sustainable economy and society. The approaches to develop these require global engineering competences (GECs), such as international and intercultural teamwork, language skills, critical thinking, and ethical and human-centered problem solving, are proving insufficient to meet the emerging challenges that this century\u27s society is facing. To develop these GECs, engineering programmes have been working on including physical and virtual mobility such as Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) together with other experiential learning interventions in order to provide the necessary requirements to become a global engineer. The aim of this practice paper is to compare and to discuss how three different universities, located in Chile, Scotland, and the United States have designed their engineering programmes to develop global engineers. This research provides preliminary results, based on an auto-ethnographic approach to analyse the curriculum design approaches and structures, that highlight opportunities for collaborative interdisciplinary experiences as well as more country- and institution-specific approaches (Engineers Without Borders) that support the development of these GECs. Analysis showed that the majority of the GECs are achieved by the three universities, however Virginia Tech is the only university that explicitly encourages and motivates other students through an assignment and cultural simulation activity. This research is part of a larger investigation that will analyse how engineering graduates perceive their development of GECs

Expectations and Experiences of Short-Term Study Abroad Leadership Teams

This paper explores the expectations and experiences of faculty, academic advisors, and graduate students leading a study abroad experience for first-year engineering students. In the current age of globalization, engineering students require a global understanding of engineering to be competent in the global workforce. In response, undergraduate engineering programs have created various programs to fill this student need. The research surrounding these initiatives focuses on the student experience but is limited when describing that of program leaders. This qualitative study draws from track leader journals that were completed during and shortly after the international program as well as semi-structured interviews in the following semester. The findings suggest that the majority of leaders expected their role to be that of an educator on the study abroad experience, but upon reflection, realized that their definition of what it means to be an educator expanded to encompass facilitation of learning. Many of the student learning instances leaders pointed to had to do with facilitating a learning environment rather than delivering content or answering technical questions. The roles described by leaders varied from troubleshooter to behavioral manager to informer. Leaders reflected that their roles developed as they met students where they were in their learning within the dynamic international context of the program. Overall, leaders saw their roles evolve over the course of the trip. The findings shed light on emergent power dynamics that leadership teams engage in outside of the formal learning environment and provide a unique insight into the types of learning program leaders can experience through leading study abroad programs. The multiple forms of data collection provide deeper insights into the experiences of the leaders while encouraging them to also reflect in real-time. This study has implications for the development of intentionally designed, condensed study-abroad experiences that draws from understanding the program leaders’ experience

Exploring students’ perceptions of engineering culture: a comparative analysis between Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and the United States

Several studies have explored engineering culture in terms of how it is perceived by engineers, students, or faculty members. However, less is known about how engineering culture varies (or not) when considering national culture as the lens. This study aims to explore how engineering students perceive different dimensions of national culture and identify any patterns that connect to how they perceive their engineering programs. We use Hofstede’s theory of dimensions of national cultures to measure culture in different ways in the student’s perceptions of engineering. Data were collected using a validated survey that explores dimensions of culture and the sample included engineering students from Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and the United States. The survey was translated into Spanish and was reviewed by several native Spanish speakers. We piloted the survey with several students. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Results provide preliminary information on how students perceive aspects of culture like individualism, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, and masculinity. We discuss the comparison of the different countries and provide implications of these results to our understanding of engineering culture

Using continuous feedback as an alternative form of students' evaluation of teaching

In this study, I evaluated the impact that providing feedback in a firstyear engineering course had in students' perceptions of teaching. An experiment was conducted with a section of 28 students in the control group and a section of 34 students in the experimental group. In the experimental group, students had the opportunity to provide weekly feedback about the course. Changes to the course on both sections were made based on the feedback. Results suggest that students in the experimental group had a better performance in the course and also had a better perception of the course at the end of the semester

Icarus: the development of a voluntary research program to increase engineering students' engagement

In order to find ways to address problems of motivation and engagement in civil engineering students, and provide students with a space to develop sense of belonging and engage with their peers through a co-curricular experience, the School of Civil Engineering at [BLINDED FOR REVIEW] in 2015 developed the Icarus program. The purpose of this exploratory study is to present preliminary information about the implementation of Icarus, as an engineering education experiment. The program's goal was to provide students with a different space to develop the competencies and skills desired while simultaneously they form their identity as engineers. The sample was 116 civil engineering students, 49 of them enrolled in the Icarus program in its first semester. Results showed that the main motivation to join the Icarus program was to apply theory from class into engineering real world issues, and to work and engage with peers. In addition, Icarus students have higher levels of aspirations on how well they will do in their engineering courses, and higher levels of deep learning when compared to other non-Icarus engineering students in the same year. Further Implications are provided

The evolution of teamwork in the engineering workplace from the first industrial revolution to industry 4.0: a literature review

Before the industrial revolution began, managing people was not an art and teamwork was not explicitly understood or studied in engineering workplaces. Following the first industrial revolution, research began on understanding people and collaboration as an important aspect for productivity in engineering. By the end of two more groundbreaking industrial revolutions, robust frameworks focusing on teamwork were introduced to enhance productivity, efficiency and profit. The most recent industrial revolution, Industry 4.0 (4IR) has been introduced in several manufacturing industries globally which is characterized by the application of information and communication technologies. In this era of manufacturing, production systems will move towards automation through expansion of network connections and enhancement of communication with other facilities. The requirement of complex collaboration and effective teamwork will further increase with the expansion of technological advancement in engineering workplace. However, industries and academia have not agreed on what important teamwork aspects are necessary to comprehend the changes in Industry 4.0. Furthermore, research is required on how to effectively develop teamwork as a competency to adapt to the new industrial revolution.The purpose of this study is to conduct a systematic review of the literature to identify a more comprehensive understanding of how teamwork has been used or proposed in engineering workplace in order to align with the changes in Industry 4.0.RQ: What aspects of teamwork have been proposed or studied in order to ensure effective teamwork for Industry 4.0 in the engineering workplace?We analyzed sources from book chapters, journals and conference papers using “Teamwork” and “Industry 4.0” as our initial search term in several databases including general database, journal database and gray literature database. We looked for key words in the scholarly papers which were relevant towards teamwork in Industry 4.0. This step yielded 32 scholarly papers that were used in the final step of the systematic review. The final step was the synthesis of our systematic review which involved identifying 7 key teamwork attributes necessary to create an effective teamwork environment in workplaces that are or will be shifting to 4IR.The results of the systematic review yielded key themes on teamwork which have been proposed for comprehending the technological advancement through the new industrial revolution in engineering workplaces. Furthermore, when these results are combined with our previous work on teamwork, we are able conclude that this study will provide valuable insights to both academia and industry who are seeking to find guidance for teamwork skills development process in order to prepare the future engineering workforce for 4IR. Also, in addition to the technical skills required in adapting to Industry 4.0, these attributes will highlight key teamwork skills which would potentially contribute towards engineering competencies among industry and academic leaders