What is wrong with Engineering Education? (in Australia)

1
What is wrong with Engineering Education? (in
Australia)

• Brendon Parker
• Dean, Faculty of Engineering
• University of New South Wales

2
Student view

• Not flexible
• Too much work
• Boring
• Poor teaching
• Crowded timetable
• Irrelevant content
• Concepts not well explained
• Staff inaccessible

3
Industry view

• Poor generic skills
• Communication
• Teamwork
• Business sense
• Life long learning skill
• Project management
• Problem solving
• Never query technical competence

4
Community view

• Role of engineering not understood or appreciated
• Role confused with technicians and craftsmen
• Dirty
• Environmental damage

5
Traditional Academic View

• Students poorly prepared at school
• They dont do enough of my specialisation
• Students dont work hard
• Student lifestyle does not suit study
• We know best
• Students too demanding
• Teaching interferes with my research
• Design is not an academic discipline

6
Sensitive new age academic view

• Lecturing inefficient and didactic
• Lab learning reduced
• Tutorials too large
• Timetable crowded
• Broad education needed at ug level

7
Can we agree on anything that is good?

• Final year research and design projects
• Early year problem solve, design and build
• Vacation work experience and CooP
• Employment outcomes

8
Common theme in what is good?

• Active learning!
• So why not do more of it?
• Projects
• Lab sessions
• Group discussion with and without tutor

9
Perceived problems with problem/ project based
learning

• Expensive in staff time
• Much less content learned
• Pressure on staff time
• Student time management
• Plagiarism
• Assessment of group work
• Subjective assessment
• accreditation

10
The advantages

• Problem solving skills
• Learning skills
• Concepts understood
• Self pacing
• Just in time learning of skills
• Tools/skills/ideas in context