Guest David E. Goldberg talks with us about shifting expectations for engineers, and reveals the crucial skills needed by tomorrow’s engineering professionals.
Listening and questioning are important skills for today’s engineer, but these subjects are rarely addressed in the engineering curriculum.
Our guest is David E. Goldberg, who is the Jerry S. Dobrovolny Distinguished Professor Emeritus at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), and the CEO of ThreeJoy Associates.
Dave obtained an amateur radio license as a teenager, allowing him to communicate around the world via a Model 15teletype machine.
A day spent shadowing a city engineer led Dave to enroll in civil engineering.
In 2010, Dr. Goldberg resigned his tenure at UICU, and undertook training as a leadership coach at Georgetown University.
Dave’s efforts with engineering reform started with iFoundry at UIUC. This project was influenced by the National Academy of Engineering report, The Engineer of 2020. Another influential report was Engineering for a Changing World, authored by James J. Duderstadt of the University of Michigan.
Making changes to the engineering curriculum is difficult, as it induces a log-rolling problem among the faculty.
It has been argued that technology and innovation are dominated by market-driven value judgments, rather than technical knowledge. This leads to engineering being a socially captive profession.
The rise and fall of engineers as business leaders may have resulted as a conflict between bureaucratic loyalty and professional independence, as outlined in The Revolt of the Engineers, a book by Edwin Layton.
Dave discusses the myth that science won World War II. Manufacturing engineers helped US factories and shipyards crank out planes, ships, and other war materiel, equaling the contributions of physicists.
After the war, “physics envy” caused changes in the engineering curriculum, as advised by the Grinter Report, issued in 1955.
While the pre-WWII engineering curriculum covered math and science at a fundamental level, the number of “hands-on” classes (drafting, shop, design, etc.) were far more prevalent than they are today.
Looking forward, innovation seems to be a crucial skill for engineers, as suggested by the following books:
When it comes to deciding whether software engineers are really “engineers,” Michael Davis of Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) points to the lack of a accredited engineering degree as a reason for disqualifying programmers from claiming “engineering” status. Our guest makes no such distinction.
Engineers need to move from being category “enhancers” to being category “creators.” Dr. Goldberg claims the primary difference between these functions is emotional, and not technical.
Whereas engineers of the past needed to be obedient in enhancing marketplace offerings, tomorrow’s engineers must be courageous in “unleashing” their creative talents to invent novel products and services.
Dave believes that engineering faculty must shift from an attitude of “I know” to “I trust” to successfully foster valiant young engineers.
In his consulting work with ThreeJoy Associates, our guest works to transform the organizational, cultural, and emotional norms of institutions committed to engineering education.
Big Beacon is a “social movement of the willing” formed to share best practices in reforming educational institutions. The project’s Twitter handle is @BigBeacon, and it has a Facebook page, as well.
Slated for release in early 2014, Dave and co-author Mark Somerville are working on a new book, titled “A Whole New Engineer: A Surprising Emotional Journey.”
Unfortunately, students entering the engineering program are subjected to an math-science death march. Alternative rites of passage may be available for aspiring engineers.
Coaching and collaborative skills may be useful for engineers who have completed a traditional engineering education. Google offers its employees a course on mindfullness.
Dave can be reached by email as “deg” at “threejoy.com.” His Twitter handle is @deg511. He can be found on Facebook as deg511.
We consider engineering education from a European perspective in this episode of The Engineering Commons.
Our guest for this episode is Sebastian Ahlström, a civil engineer who is pursuing a masters degree at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, Sweden.
An interest in buildings and construction led our guest to pursue a degree in civil engineering.
In Sweden, high-school students have to decide whether they are going to pursue a 3-year bachelors degree or a 5-year masters degree. Unlike academic programs in the US, the bachelors degree does not necessarily prepare one for acquiring a masters degree.
Sebastian reports having to write a thesis as part of his bachelors degree, as opposed to completing a senior project.
Having spent a year working on road construction, our guest has decided he’d rather work on erecting buildings. A valuable insight resulting from hands-on experience!
It is common in Sweden for students to wait one to three years after graduating from high school before beginning their college education.
Grades in Swedish universities are almost entirely based on the results of final exams, with little weight or emphasis given to homework, quizzes, and mid-terms.
Brian mentions the Swedish disporia in Minnesota, which refers to a region where Swedish emigrants have gathered.
Sebastian struggled with the units of measure used here in the US, much preferring the metric system used elsewhere in the world.
The group briefly discusses the difference between a foot-pound (energy) and a pound-foot (torque). Per Wikipedia: “Both energy and torque can be expressed as a product of a force vector with a displacement vector (hence pounds and feet); energy is the scalar product of the two, and torque is the vector product.”
We talk a bit about job opportunities in Sweden and the European Union.
Sebastian can be reached at sebastian.p.ahlstrom –at– gmail.com.
Thanks to Michael Coghlan for the photo titled “Chalmers Campus (Gothenburg University).” Podcast theme music provided by Paul Stevenson
Brian and Jeff talk with Ann McMahon about sharing one’s passion for engineering with pre-college students.
Brian has experienced the glassy-eyed look of others listening to his engineering stories.
Our guest for this episode is Ann McMahon, an aerospace engineer who advises educators on how best to share science and engineering with K-12 students.
Ann originally wanted to be an astrophysicist, but ended up in the aerospace industry after acquiring degrees in mechanical engineering.
After a career with McDonnell Douglas, our guest started volunteering in her son’s classroom; this led to an interest in educational matters.
For the past decade, Ann has been working with the Smithsonian Institution’s National Science Resources Center as a National Faculty member for a program called Leadership Assistance for Science Education Reform (LASER).
Brian wonders if engineering will ever be taught as its own subject; Ann is hopeful that schools are moving their curricula in this direction.
“Wicked” problems are complex issues that have no “right” or “wrong” answers; and each possible solution presents even more potentially unforeseen consequences.
In comparison, “tame” problems are definitively right or wrong, and lack the complexity of real-world issues.
Having right or wrong answers, rather than evaluating tradeoffs, misses the essence of the engineering profession.
It will likely take time for educators to determine how to assign grades in the absence of easily-defended solutions.
An effort is being made in many classrooms to emphasize non-cognitive skills, such as collaborating, taking on the perspectives of others, arguing from evidence, and getting along with other team members.
The concept of an “object world” is introduced in Designing Engineers by Louis L. Bucciarelli.
Ann recently gave a TEDx talked titled Engineering Empathy (use password tedxgladstone).
We learn best when we are supported by relationships with important others who help us stretch to master new challenges and cope with potentially overwhelming situations.
Relationships that a child has with a teacher and peers at school are influenced by the child’s earlier experiences.
Our ability to learn is influenced by our mental state, as indicated in the following diagram.
Ann believes that engineering offers unique opportunities for students to acquire important cognitive and social skills, including a chance to practice emotional regulation.
Design competitions are great for some students, but others may not thrive in such an environment.
Sharing what we know, at an appropriate level, is the best way to convey our interest in engineering with students.
Ann can be reached at annpmcmahon *at* gmail.com; or found online at AnnPMcMahon.com.
Thanks to PiK Yeoh for the photo titled “Child-craft.” Podcast theme music provided by Paul Stevenson
Guest David E. Goldberg talks with us about shifting expectations for engineers, and reveals the crucial skills needed by tomorrow’s engineering professionals.
