Research Initiation: Effectively Integrating Sustainability within an Engineering Program

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The engineering curriculum typically focuses exclusively on the technical aspects of the engineering profession. This technical emphasis alone can be a barrier for students to enter engineering. Furthermore, students receiving only technical preparation are less able to approach complex problems involving multiple perspectives, e.g. ethics, economics, social justice, etc. Sustainability is a fundamentally complex issue that covers many of these additional perspectives. Thus, topics in sustainable energy engineering, such as hydraulic fracture oil well stimulation (fracking), can be used to not only teach technical engineering concepts but also expose students to broader issues. By considering these complex engineering problems more holistically, students from a range of diverse backgrounds (particularly women and Native Americans) will more likely enter and remain in engineering. These students will then be better prepared to address the major challenges facing society. This project is initiating research into how best to integrate these sustainability topics throughout the curriculum to maximize these benefits in engineering education. To spread successful elements, the research team is facilitating institutionally-sponsored effective teaching and sustainability workshops for engineering faculty as well as K-12 STEM teachers. More broadly, the results will increase awareness of the engineering profession and its association with issues in sustainability.The overall research aim is to improve the professional formation (recruitment, retention, and preparation) of diverse engineering students by integrating sustainability within engineering education programs. This research is studying the effectiveness of integration approaches within different required and elective undergraduate engineering courses, as well as within engineering faculty development and outreach activities. Two basic questions are being addressed related to the integration methods: (1) does it work? and (2) what are the barriers? Framing the proposed research are theoretical models describing student learning styles; cognitive, social and professional development; sustainability literacy; as well as the ontology of and attitudes toward engineering. These aims are being accomplished by leveraging existing resources within the Chemical Engineering program at Montana State University: a recently-tenured engineering faculty member (PI); two unique engineering elective courses including a large, entry-level "energy and sustainability" university-core science course aimed at non-STEM majors, and a smaller upper-level engineering elective course focused on "sustainable energy"; a pre-tenure engineering faculty collaborator (Co-PI) who instructs a large required engineering course (fluid mechanics); an established educational psychologist (Co-PI) experienced with theoretical frameworks, assessment, and data collection and analysis; and, ongoing outreach activities including engineering student presentations to local 4th grade classrooms and workshops for both MSU engineering faculty and K-12 teachers on Native American reservations. The PIs are systematically investigating the integration of contemporary sustainability issues within the three undergraduate engineering courses and various workshop and outreach activities. Ad hoc interdisciplinary teams of professionals within academia and industry are being established to grow engineering education research capacity and help align future research directions with industry needs. Validated and/or adapted assessment instruments and analyses of candid research participant comments will provide rich quantitative and qualitative data sets from unique research participant cohorts. Periodic assessment of participant cohorts and control groups is being conducted to determine legacy impacts, and results will help inform future research and innovation in engineering education.