The Review of Engineering Education has been undertaken by
and has been supported by
The Exposure Draft Report has been developed from wide-ranging national consultations involving six task force studies of the interaction between engineering education and industry, the profession, students, the community, educational institutions and educational programs.
Written comment outlining suggested improvements will be accepted for consideration until Friday, 20 September 1996.
CONTENTS
Foreword
The Recommendations of the Report
Purpose of Review and Methodology
1. Engineering Education at a Crossroads
2. The Future of the Profession
3. Outcomes of Engineering Education
4. Internationalisation and Competition
6. Delivery of Engineering Education
A Recent Reviews of Engineering Education
C Consultations and Submissions
D Membership of Steering Committee and Task Forces
E Workshop Participants
Note: Appendices will be included in the final report. The report will be in three volumes:
Volume 1: Executive summary and recommendations
Volume 2: The Report
Volume 3: The Reports of the Task Forces and some relevant papers
The Review of Engineering Education
The Review of Engineering Education is recommending no less than a culture
change in engineering education which must be more outward looking with
the capability to produce graduates to lead the engineering profession in
its involvement with the great social, economic, environmental and cultural
challenges of our time.
By participating in the Review, the three sponsoring organisations - The
Institution of Engineers, Australia, The Academy of Technological Sciences
and Engineering, and the Australian Council of Engineering Deans - have
demonstrated their determination to work together to implement major changes
to engineering education. The Recommendations of the Review respond to the
societal and global changes identified in the reports of the review Task
Forces. The Review participants expect that the sponsoring bodies will act
swiftly and decisively to bring about the restructuring of courses while
building on present strengths in the engineering schools. It is also considered
to be important that Australian industry be fully involved in the restructuring.
The contribution of engineers to society is critical to development, to
efficient and sustainable wealth creation and to international competitiveness.
The changes which have taken place and which will continue to take place
in society, in technology and in industry, locally, nationally and internationally,
require that engineering education responds to the changes.
Engineering education in Australia has a good reputation for producing flexible and adaptive engineers. But within the context of recent rapid change and the expectation of an accelerated rate of change, it is apparent that engineering education must now be reconsidered and redirected to enable engineering students to contribute in the most effective way to the new challenges identified in the report.
The Review was established by The Institution of Engineers, Australia, the Australian Council of Engineering Deans and the Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering with the support of the Department of Employment Education and Training, and has been conducted by a steering committee whose members cover a wide range of interests and experience from the engineering profession, from education, from industry and from the community. Six task forces with membership from around Australia have produced reports concerned with the interface between engineering education and students, industry, the profession, the community, and educational programs. The present report and recommendations draw upon the work of the task forces.
Professor Peter Johnson AO
Chairman, Steering Committee
BROADENING THE CULTURE OF THE ENGINEERING PROFESSION FOR ITS ROLE INTO THE 21st CENTURY
RECOMMENDATION 1
1.1 That in consideration of the increasingly critical social, economic and environmental responsibilities facing the engineering profession and the expectations of governments and the community, actions be taken by IEAust, ACED and ATSE, including the introduction of appropriate changes to undergraduate and continuing education courses, to ensure that engineering graduates are able to:
1.2 That in view of the continuing serious imbalance between the numbers of men and women entering the engineering profession, and the continuing predominance of men in the profession, IEAust, ACED and ATSE take appropriate steps to encourage more women to enter the profession and in so doing to draw particularly upon the resource of women engineers in developing and broadening the culture of the engineering profession to make it more diverse and flexible and inclusive of a wider range of values and attitudes than at present.
INTAKE TO ENGINEERING COURSES
RECOMMENDATION 2
2.1 That student numbers entering engineering schools at least be kept at
present levels for the immediate future provided that the quality of new
enrolments can at least be maintained.
2.2 That measures are taken by the universities to ensure that there is
an early improvement in the quality of new enrolments. (See also recommendation
8)
2.3 That Government and the universities continually monitor the demand
for graduates and allow for an increase of enrolments during the first decade
of next century to provide for expected growth in engineering activity and
associated research and development which will be necessary if Australia
is to maintain a strong position among the world's developed countries.
2.4 That a study is made of the proportion of local to overseas entrants
to courses to ensure that the number of graduates available to meet demand
in industry in Australia is not unduly reduced by overseas graduates returning
to their countries.
2.5 That the intake of migrant engineers is carefully monitored to ensure that numbers admitted can be gainfully employed and are at an appropriate standard, but that they are not admitted in such numbers as to reduce the demand for local graduates.
RECONSIDERING
UNDERGRADUATE ENGINEERING COURSES
RECOMMENDATION 3
That the Deans through ACED and in consultation with IEAust reconsider undergraduate
engineering courses starting immediately in order to:
i address the significant changes facing the profession including globalisation,
information technology, environmental sustainability, and bio-technologies;
ii ensure as a generic requirement that all bachelor of engineering courses
include basic science, engineering fundamentals, management and business,
ethics, with attention to social, environmental, political and economic
context, appropriately integrated to provide a broad base relating to engineering
practice in a social context;
iii provide choices in their courses leading to broad based generalist degrees
or degrees providing preparation for specific specialisations which may
lead to postgraduate specialist courses;
iv include 'sustainable development' as an important component of engineering
courses to ensure that graduates have an understanding of the future as
well as the present needs of society in terms of resource deployment, technological
development and organisational change;
iv result in a diversity of courses across the engineering education system
relative to the particular balance of general and specialised material from
school to school, taking into account the needs of industry and requiring
local and national collaboration between schools
vi encourage a balance within courses between engineering practice and engineering
science to ensure that the importance of practice is understood and take
appropriate account of the need for students who follow an engineering science
stream to meet additional requirements for full professional accreditation;
and
vii ensure the development of capability in the following three areas: sound science and engineering fundamentals, communication, and teamwork and learning skills.
DEVELOPING A REVISED ACCREDITATION SYSTEM
FOR ENGINEERING COURSES FOR
INTRODUCTION IN 2000
RECOMMENDATION 4
4.1 That IEAust, in close formal collaboration with ACED, develop for implementation
in the year 2000 a new accreditation system for the revised undergraduate
engineering courses, which:
i. gives recognition to the significant changes facing the profession and
to the critical and distinctive attributes of engineers for the future;
ii ensures compliance with the requirements for courses as set down in Recommendation
3;
iii stimulates innovation, experimentation, diversity and quality assurance
both in courses and their delivery;
iv is receptive to new and emerging technologies;
v includes assessment of the performance of academic staff members;
vi ensures the development of an inclusive engineering education culture
which takes account of and includes the values and attitudes recommended
in the National Position Paper for Women in Engineering.
(Note: ABET Engineering Criteria 2000 will provide a valuable advisory source.)
4.2 That visiting panels for the accreditation of schools be constituted
to include industry representation.
4.3 That IEAust and ACED as a matter of urgency, establish a working party to canvass the problems which engineering schools foresee in the introduction of a revised accreditation system, as this relates to students and staff, and propose the means of managing the transition in ways which do not disadvantage present students or present staff and which maintain career paths for staff members with research strengths.
CONSIDERATION OF THE NUMBER AND NATURE OF ENGINEERING SCHOOLS
RECOMMENDATION 5
5.1 That universities individually consider the viability of their engineering
schools in terms of their local circumstances, context, performance, quality,
and opportunities for effective merging, networking using modern technologies,
and sharing of resources.
5.2 That the Divisions of IEAust assist at a local level by convening fact finding task forces jointly with the local deans and local industry to gather information about the local circumstances and context which will assist the Deans in theconsideration of the viability of their courses and in evaluating the possibilities of networking and sharing of resources.
ADVANCED ENGINEERING CENTRES FOR COLLABORATIVE ACTIVITY
AND PARTNERSHIP WITH INDUSTRY
RECOMMENDATION 6
6.1 That IEAust and ACED in conjunction with industry representatives discuss
with Government means of establishing and of financing Advanced Engineering
Centres which will be internationally competitive with world class expertise
and facilities with the objective of promoting Australian industrial strength
and its research and development capability. Such centres would include
contract research and its commercialisation, technology transfer, consultancy
and specialist education and training courses. ( Note: Although at the present time of economic stringency it may be difficult
in the short term for this recommendation to be achieved it is important
for discussion to commence in view of the potential benefit to the economic
well being of the country and to the industries that would participate as
well as encouraging innovation and industry relevance in the engineering
schools. The application of present government policies should be explored
to determine their relevance to the early development of the Centres.)
6.2 That Advanced Engineering Centres be constituted in such a way as to maximise collaboration between universities and to provide for associate membership by other universities and their staff.
ESTABLISHING
A NATIONAL CENTRE for ENGINEERING POLICY
RECOMMENDATION 7
That ATSE and IEAust with the support of industry explore the formation of a National Centre for Engineering Policy as a 'think tank', commissioning the best people in Australia and overseas to provide research and independent policy advice across a full range of engineering issues, including engineering education.
ATTRACTING ENTRANTS TO THE PROFESSION OF ENGINEERING
RECOMMENDATION 8
That IEAust and ACED with industry assistance, in parallel with changes
to engineering education, develop strategies to understand better the attitudes
of potential entrants to the profession and work with education departments
and schools to make changes which will encourage an increasing number of
school students to seek a career in engineering.
i facilitating the setting up of engineering networks in high schools for
students and parents, to ensure that the social and environmental responsibilities
of engineers are understood as well as technical achievements;
ii providing assistance to school curriculum committees and education boards
including positively influencing the teaching of mathematics, science and
technology at the primary and secondary school levels;
iii providing adequate work experience opportunities for school students
iv developing and supporting the production of relevant informative material
in printed and electronic format; and
v developing communication with school teachers and career counsellors and those who are being educated for these occupations.
INTRODUCING FLEXIBILITY
OF ACCESS TO AND CONDUCT OF COURSES
RECOMMENDATION 9
9.1 That a four-year equivalent full-time bachelor of engineering program,
or equivalent programs operating in different modes, remain the minimum
formal educational requirements to develop the attributes needed in graduates
for graduate, and ultimately Corporate Membership of IEAust.
9.2 That Deans take steps to reduce overloading of curricula and the formal
class contact time required of undergraduate students in favour of alternative
modes of learning and expanded opportunities for extra-curricula activity,
and for engagement with industry.
9.3 That universities actively facilitate entry of students from non-traditional
backgrounds through relaxation of prerequisite subjects, with bridging programs
and flexible entry paths addressing the potential diversity of students'
background knowledge and placing value on a range of skills and prior learning
that will have been acquired through alternative entry paths.
9.4 That Government and universities provide the capability within the engineering
education system to allow for some bachelor of engineering or combined degree
programs longer than four years of equivalent full-time study (as conventionally
run over two semesters per year) to accommodate a range of special requirements
in graduates for their first employment opportunities, and to accommodate
special entry requirements.
9.5 That Deans increase provision of diverse pathways within courses to
allow for a widening range of student cultural backgrounds and academic
abilities.
9.6 That Deans consider the needs of vocational education sector students by providing articulation and credit transfer arrangement for suitably qualified Associate Diploma (or its equivalent) holders via a partnership approach between universities and TAFE, giving at least 25% credit overall of a bachelor of engineering course within the one discipline.
DEVELOPING STAFFING PROFILES
ENCOURAGING TEACHING EXCELLENCE
RECOMMENDATION 10
That, as a means of achieving excellence and an appropriate mix of strengths,
each engineering school under the leadership of the dean, develop staffing
profiles to include a balance of strengths in the areas of teaching and
learning, research, professional practice, industry experience and community
service, and adopt policies for the recruitment, development and reward
(including appropriate remuneration) of staff which:
i value and reward excellence and advancement in all of these areas;
ii promote secondments, exchanges, joint and adjunct appointments, and mobility
between the academic institution and industry;
iii promote diversity in terms of gender, culture and academic and workplace
experience;
iv encourage educational development, awareness of affirmative action and
management of diversity; and
v ensure that staff undertake formal courses in learning and teaching.
ENCOURAGING A GREATER INVOLVEMENT
OF INDUSTRY IN ENGINEERING EDUCATION
RECOMMENDATION 11
That IEAust and ACED join with industry and government in encouraging and
assisting universities and companies to establish effective and enduring
partnerships that involve and reward all participants, and remove unnecessary
impediments to the formation and operation of such partnerships. Increasing
collaboration of this kind should become a preferred mechanism for delivering
many aspects of engineering education, with particular reference to:
i greater provision of temporary placements for students noting that placements
of semester or greater length can provide better value to both students
and industry than vacation placements;
ii expansion of cooperative education schemes;
iii enhancement of understanding of engineering practice among academic
staff through such mechanisms as secondments to industry, staff exchange
programs and the use of adjunct professorships for appropriate industry
practitioners - this can be aided by more flexible university policies in
regard to the balance of salary, superannuation and other benefits in remuneration
packages;
iv improving access by academic institutions to industry workplaces, to
equipment for practical familiarisation, and to projects noting that issues
such as insurance, occupational health and safety and compensation will
need to be resolved;
v developing professional/industrial postgraduate diploma and masters programs
in close collaboration with industry to meet industry needs and obtain greater
industry involvement in the education system, and including proposals for
funding;
vi providing industry funded student scholarships;
vii establishing Advanced Engineering Centres (refer Recommendation 6);
viii forming coalitions for courseware development (refer Recommendation
12); and
ix Developing an accreditation system of industrial organisations and industrial staff to ensure that interaction is effective.
ENCOURAGING COLLABORATION BETWEEN SCHOOLS
RECOMMENDATION 12
12.1 That engineering schools in conjunction with their parent institutions
seek alliances of mutual benefit with other engineering schools and TAFE,
to maximise access to and utilisation of scarce resources, in particular
to provide the opportunity for students Australia wide to choose from a
range of high quality adequately resourced engineering programs.
12.2 That the engineering schools, with the support of Government and industry, establish a program to develop coalitions of engineering schools for the production of innovative engineering courseware, to be made available to other schools on a basis to be determined.
ENSURING THE DEVELOPMENT of DIVERSITY
OF ENGINEERING SCHOOLS
RECOMMENDATION 13
13.1 That government and institutional policies ensure diversity in engineering
schools by the encouragement of distinctive approaches and courses, taking
particular account of the needs of industry and the community and with the
common aim of achieving excellence.
13.2 That the delivery of undergraduate programs in a variety of attendance
modes, using the full range of traditional and innovative flexible delivery
methods be encouraged across the system.
13.3 That each engineering school with the support of its parent institution,
be obliged to publish its distinctive mission and objectives, to be reviewed
and revised at frequent regular intervals.
13.4 That each engineering school with the support of its parent institution, take steps to ensure that the incentives and rewards to staff align with the published mission of the school. (refer Recommendation 10)
MANAGING THE IMPLEMENTATION of
THE RECOMMENDATIONS of
THE REVIEW
RECOMMENDATION 14
That IEAust, ACED and ATSE examine ways of coordinating and utilising their
committee structures to:
i monitor over the next decade the implementation of this Review of Engineering
Education and the general state of engineering education in Australia, with
concise annual reporting to the councils of the three bodies in a form suitable
for submitting to Government and for public dissemination;
ii work with the VET sector on a review of programs that lead to Associate
Membership of IEAust; and
iii develop an immediate action plan and program for implementation.
Representatives of the three co-proposers of the Review, the Australian
Council of Engineering Deans, The Institution of Engineers, Australia and
the Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering, assembled a Steering
Committee with broad representation of the stakeholders in engineering education.
The primary aims were to examine, report upon, and make recommendations
relating to the evolving structure of engineering education in Australia,
primarily at professional level, but with due regard to the increasing importance
being placed on articulation, recognition of prior learning and continuing
education. Detailed terms of reference were grouped into six major tasks
to be co-ordinated by the Steering Committee and to be undertaken by Task
Forces, each with broad membership. The Task Forces were:
The Task Force reports are in Volume 2 of the Review, together with discussion
papers prepared by members of the Task Forces (Wallace, 1995; WIE, 1996).
The Review began with a public call for submissions, an issues paper (Webster
& Clyde 1995) and a futures conference (Webster, 1996) to set the visionary
theme. The report of this Conference will be in Volume 3 of the Review.
Information concerning Terms of Reference and Membership of the Steering Committee and Task Forces is contained in Appendices B and D.
1. ENGINEERING EDUCATION AT A CROSSROADS
Engineers fulfil a vital role in society. By taking responsible actions
in a global marketplace they contribute to the quality of life to which
Australians aspire. Engineering is critical to raising our national capability
in technology and innovation both for the imperative of competitive trade
and for ecologically sustainable development. Australian engineering education
has a good reputation for producing flexible and adaptive engineers. However,
with the dramatic changes taking place in all aspects of society, the current
education system must now work towards delivering the types and numbers
of high calibre engineers needed to enable Australia to maintain and further
develop its position in an increasingly complex and demanding world. To
ignore this opportunity for change would put at risk important elements
of our national development and the future for our youth.
"It seems to me that we need to think and act boldly to meet the demands
of a very challenging future. A mere tinkering with the present system will
not be enough."
Sir Arvi Parbo, President, ATSE, Launch of Review of Engineering Education,
2 June 1995
LOOKING AHEAD
Australia is inextricably involved in worldwide changes. Many of our basic
assumptions as a society are being challenged and reconsidered. The cessation
of the political and military certainties of the Cold War, the economic
ascendancy of Asia, the debate over public versus private ownership of national
infrastructure, the accelerating IT&T revolution, globalisation of trade
and consequential blurring of national boundaries and sovereignty in international
business, the incorporation of 'green' issues including technological sustainability
into the political agenda, are all manifestations of the forces reshaping
our world.
Technology is one catalyst bringing about these changes. More significantly,
the responsible creation and ownership of new technology is an essential
requirement for meaningful participation in the emerging world. This ownership
has both commercial and cultural dimensions. In this climate of change and
increasing global competition, our traditional dependence on low value-added
primary and mining products to generate our wealth has resulted in a standard
of living which has not advanced as rapidly as that in other countries over
the past several decades. The national imperative to increase wealth creation
by becoming the 'clever country' was expounded almost a decade ago. Achieving
this goal requires us to rethink some of our most fundamental myths and
understandings about how we function and what we stand for as a nation.
Engineering education is not immune from that process.
Engineering schools have been educating engineers who have been employed,
for the most part, in the traditional extractive and medium to large scale
manufacturing industries and in the provision and maintenance of our national
built infrastructure, or as researchers or academics. Engineers will still
be needed in these roles into the next century, but with a higher proportion
of engineers trained for manufacturing industry's needs, particularly SMEs.
However, engineering education must reset many of its priorities if it is
to be instrumental in the transformation of the profession in this country.
The ASTEC Study, Matching Science and Technology to Future Needs 2010 (ASTEC,
1996) identified four key forces for change:
Educating the new engineer is essential if we are to achieve the quality of life and the standard
of living to which we aspire in an increasingly competitive world into the
21st century. This challenge to engineering education comes at a time of
fundamental change in universities.
Over the coming decades, engineering education in Australia will become
more outward looking and intimately associated with commerce and industry,
with professional associations and with the community. The culture and practice
of engineering education will be transformed through the much greater participation
of women, as students, as teachers and as mentors. The focus of engineering
education will be on the learners, from early education to graduate school,
from undergraduates to life-long learners, and from technical specialists
to those curious about the ubiquitous technology in our lives. It will be
regional and global in its outlook, yet local in its actions, attuned to
the aspirations of the individual learner.
Engineering education will be outgoing and connected, enterprising and innovative,
aware of the breadth of its responsibilities in fulfilling its obligations
to the community it serves. It will provide leadership in shaping the profession
as it enters the 21st century through the robust presentation of ideas in
public debate, through its new graduates, through renewed practitioners
participating in its continuous education programs, and through its engagement
with a wide variety of community and other educational groups. It will be
open to new ideas and new approaches.
The education of engineers will not be confined to engineering schools as
we have come to know them in universities. The tertiary education landscape
will continue to be reshaped in response to external and internal forces
and over the next decade will be transformed. The monopoly on undergraduate
engineering education currently held by universities will be broken. There
will be more private and industry based-engineering education and training,
including providers of
undergraduate level education. Students and practitioners will be able to
choose from local, national and international providers. The diffusion of
information technology and high bandwidth telecommunications systems (IT&T)
will increase access to learning resources irrespective of where the learner
and the provider are located.
In response to local opportunities, there will be considerable differentiation
in the offerings of engineering schools. Distinctive visions, missions and
practices are already beginning to appear, especially in the regional universities.
A relaxation of central planning in education in Australia will accelerate
this process. The formation of professional engineers, not merely the period
of formal training at university, and the processes of continual development
of these practitioners throughout their careers, will be more clearly understood
and addressed. This will involve a combination of strategic and just-in-time
learning mechanisms.
Students will be more responsible for their learning. The highly structured
and prescriptive nature of traditional undergraduate courses in engineering
will be replaced by programs affording greater freedom of choice. Prior
learning and work experience will receive more ready recognition. There
will be a consequential shift in ownership of the education process from
staff to student, from teacher to learner. Correspondingly, engineering
educators, whether based in industry or at a university, will assume the
role of coach and mentor. Learning programs will be customised to suit the
personal, educational, and professional needs of the individual.
The current constraints of funding, restrictive policies and professional
socialisation that bind engineering education and indeed most university
education will be cut, releasing engineering educators to be more innovative,
responsive and adventuresome in the things they attempt. Perhaps the most
fundamental change in engineering education over the next 15 years will
be the cultural transformation within engineering schools. From being inward
looking, enclosed, and self-absorbed, they will become outward looking communities,
drawing strength and purpose from their interactions with practice and the
society. Attitudes and approaches to students, industry and the wider community
will change fundamentally. There will be corresponding changes in the students'
appreciation of the formal engineering education, in the willingness of
industry and alumni to contribute to and participate in education, and in
the rising awareness and appreciation in the community of engineering and
engineering education.
Engineering activity in this country, and its image, have been dominated
by large projects and related infrastructure developments. These projects
have been associated with large, stable public and private engineering organisations.
Like any profession, engineering is in danger of being captive to its self-perception
when looking to the future. Graduates in 2010 are likely to be creating
their own enterprises or working in community organisations, rather than
simply seeking employment in a company. This shift implies a substantial
change in the expectations graduates bring to and develop during their formal
engineering education. There will be a consequential shift in the learning
culture at university. Until now universities have worked on the implicit
assumption that their students will simply take up positions in existing
public and private corporations upon graduation. The growing global mobility
of engineers will also demand that qualifications be recognised internationally.
THE PRESENT VIEWPOINT
Engineering schools in Australia have for many years provided a steady and
reliable base for educating professional engineers of generally high quality.
This effort has been focused predominantly at the undergraduate level. In
the past it was shaped by a national economy based on export earnings from
rural products and minerals, a small, protected manufacturing base centred
on the domestic market, and infrastructure development and maintenance with
engineers employed predominantly in government departments and semi-government
utilities. The changes in the economy of the country in recent years have
had an impact on engineering education. Meanwhile, our engineering graduates
and academic staff have been readily accepted into industry and universities
in Britain and North America. They are increasing their reputations in South-East
Asia. The educational innovation in many of our engineering schools is respected
at international conferences. Lately, we have been accepted in South-East
Asia as a provider of quality undergraduate and postgraduate engineering
courses.
Conventional forms of postgraduate education and research have grown dramatically
since the 1970s. They have largely emulated the North American tradition
of graduate schools, even though the industrial base in North America is
quite different from that in Australia, especially in high technology industries
and manufacturing. Government policy initiatives, such as the Cooperative
Research Centre and Advanced Engineering Centre programs, and the deregulation
of fees for postgraduate coursework programs, are now facilitating postgraduate
change and partnerships that are not matched at the undergraduate level.
Engineering education in Australia has been the subject of a number of important
reviews over the last decade. The most comprehensive were led by Wragge
(1987), Williams (1988), Skillington (1991) and Fell (1991). (Appendix A
is a summary of recent Australian and overseas reviews.) A proportion of
the important recommendations from these reviews have fallen on stony ground.
Some of them, such as those in the Wragge Report on generalisation versus
specialisation, are being revisited in this review. The fact that others
such as those in the Skillington report which drew attention to the need
for improving employment conditions for engineering academics and for upgrading
equipment in the laboratories are not as explicitly reconsidered does not
mean that we believe they have been adequately resolved. Academic staff
are conscious that the deficiencies are still there and the process of working
through the cultural changes referred to in the closing chapter will have
to be coupled with responding to these pressing needs.
The global and societal changes, both in recent years and in the foreseeable
future, present a new set of challenges, many of which could not have been
foreseen by earlier reviews. These challenges include:
At an early stage the Review Committee recognised that engineering education
is facing challenges to a number of its basic values; it is facing a change
of paradigm. For this reason we have intentionally resisted making arguments
based on a comprehensive collection of data and statistics pertinent to
the present paradigm. (Some statistics from the present education system
are in Appendix B.) Instead, through a set of Task Forces that have engaged
many of those with a direct interest in engineering education at all levels,
we have identified and made recommendations on seven vital issues. These
issues, if not addressed now, will threaten quality, attractiveness, relevance
and viability of engineering education and the whole engineering profession.
Each is considered in this report under the following chapter headings:
Although hampered by shortage of funds, Australia's engineering academics have been praised for their actions in response to the recommendations of the Williams Review (Caldwell et al., 1994). The recommendations for change in this new Review stem from a carefully considered view that the system in which engineering educators have worked must now respond to the many external changes that are occurring.
2. THE FUTURE OF THE PROFESSION
In coming to grips with the notion of 'the future of the engineering profession', two particular concerns emerged: the dangers in assuming that traditional roles and practices will continue, and the under-representation of women and other minority groups in the profession, creating an imbalance.
A CHANGING PROFESSION
Educational programs provide the linkage between the capability of students
at entry to engineering education and the occupational demands on exit into
the profession. There are many indicators that the engineering profession
is facing significant change. How it develops its role for the next century
will have a major impact on the future of engineering education. In turn,
the future outcomes of engineering education could well determine the long-term
viability of the profession in terms of engineers laying claim to an unambiguous
occupational role in society.
The Review Committee has received consistent warnings about the future of
the profession from a range of sources. These warnings are captured in the
following private communication from Professor Ron Johnston, Deputy Chair
of the ASTEC Study, Matching Science and Technology to Future Needs 2010.
"We must accept that professional engineering is no longer easily defined.
Applied scientists are frequently being employed to do what was previously
thought of as 'engineering work' in emerging disciplines, for example, computer
scientists, biotechnologists and environmental scientists. The challenge
to the engineering profession is to define its unique characteristics, to
guide the education system to produce graduates with the necessary attributes,
and to establish pathways for applied scientists with appropriate experience
to achieve professional engineering status."
The Review Committee has identified the following key features of the engineering
profession on which its future will continue to be based:
The engineering profession has serious problems in satisfying the first
feature: a distinct identifiable group. This is because engineering rarely
features in its own right in public discourse. It has been subsumed in the
term 'science and technology' at the policy level. (This problem is addressed
in Recommendation 7.) Also, professional engineering does not have public
recognition of exclusive use of the label 'engineer', a term which is used
at a number of different levels. Its boundaries are continually changing
due to internal and external pressures.
Distinctive features of traditional professional engineers that will endure
into the next century include their ability to synthesise solutions, integrating
technical understanding from various sources into systems to serve society's
needs, and thus creating wealth for society in a competitive world. A key
responsibility of the profession will be responsible wealth creation, taking
full account of ethical considerations and the aim of ecologically sustainable
development in meeting the needs of society.
As the technical, economic and social constraints within which engineers
must operate increase in complexity, we will see the emergence of the 'knowledge
engineer'. In the emerging knowledge economy the demand is for people with
a broad range of knowledge and understanding, with ability to address not
only the technical dimension (which never occurs in isolation) but also
the financial, legal, marketing, organisational, environmental, social and
ethical aspects.
In addition, we have moved from only having engineering which is solid-
and fluid-based to also having engineering which is electron- and information-based.
Now we are increasingly moving into engineering which requires biological
knowledge, from biomedical through microbiological and environmental areas.
No one engineer can have specialised knowledge across the broad spectrum.
We have to come to terms with how all of these fit within the one profession
and what it is that links them to give the profession (and education for
the profession) unity.
The current impact of the IT&T revolution on engineering education goes
beyond the teaching and learning processes that are addressed in Chapter
6. It is demanding the preparation of students for increasing use of computers
in their careers. For example, students must now be prepared for the centrality
of computer models of the products in manufacturing enterprises, and of
the projects in construction enterprises, allowing uncorrupted data transfer
between decision making steps and production units.
We conclude that the engineering profession will have a vital role in the society of the
next century, but it needs to 're-engineer' itself and the system of engineering
education that underpins it. Most patterns and assumptions that have ruled,
and proved to be of considerable value over the past hundred years, are
in many cases out of date and no longer effective.
We further conclude that into the next century engineering activity will continue to be conducted predominantly by professional engineers who have completed accredited programs of study and experience. This is consistent with the recent long-term planning of engineering education in North America and Germany (Appendix A), and in particular with the revised accreditation procedures in the United States (ABET, 1995).
A REPRESENTATIVE PROFESSION
The engineering profession of the future can only serve society effectively
if its ranks are representative of society. Women presently make up only
5% of the professional engineering workforce. The Williams Review in 1988
sounded a strong warning:
'The engineering profession is impoverished by this failure to attract females.''
In the course of this Review, many employers have highlighted the new dimensions
that women bring to the judgemental processes in engineering practice, as
evidenced by their increasing participation in multidisciplinary sectors
such as environmental and biomedical engineering. But women cannot be made
to take up an engineering career. They must be attracted to it. Despite
active promotion and recruiting campaigns by IEAust and the engineering
schools, the profession at the beginning of the next century will remain
predominantly male unless it pays more attention to the messages coming
from sources such as the National Position Paper for Women in Engineering
(WIE, 1996). Many women are looking for different fulfilment than men from
their work and career choice. Many women engineers feel that their values
are not appreciated within the work and learning environments which are
so numerically male dominated. Within engineering organisations and educational
programs, women seek to promote more human values.
The Williams Review recommended that the proportion of female students in
engineering education should increase from 7% in 1986 to 20% in 1997. Table
1, which summarises female enrolments for all levels of engineering study
(WIE, 1996), indicates that this is not likely to be achieved next year.
The data obtained from DEETYA is based on its broad category of engineering
and surveying and so includes a relatively small number of surveying students.
The figures are a reasonable estimate of engineering enrolments. The time
of most rapid increase in female students enrolling in engineering was over
the period from 1986 to 1990, this being the period of maximum State and
Federal funding for gender related intervention programs in the education
sectors. The rate of increase has slowed since then.
Table 1. Percentage of female engineering and surveying enrolments in higher education (undergraduate and postgraduate), from 1986 to 1995. (Source; Higher Education Division of DEET).
1986 | 1987 | 1988 | 1989 | 1990 | 1991 | 1992 | 1993 | 1994 | 1995 | 1996 |
5.6 | 6.7 | 7.8 | 8.9 | 10.1 | 10.8 | 11.8 | 12.5 | 13.1 |
These aggregate data hide the wide variations in female enrolments across
universities and across disciplines. (More detail is available in the National
Position Paper on Women in Engineering (WIE, 1996).) The figures suggest
that there is no room for complacency.
An inclusive culture in the engineering education system is needed to attract
women and students from other minority groups.
We conclude that all parties responsible for engineering education must reappraise their
roles in transforming the engineering profession by providing our future
engineers with experiences to help form values, attitudes and behaviours
that are characteristic of an inclusive and socially aware profession.
RECOMMENDATION 1
1.1 That in consideration of the increasingly critical social, economic
and environmental responsibilities facing the engineering profession and
the expectations of governments and the community, actions be taken by IEAust,
ACED and ATSE, including the introduction of appropriate changes to undergraduate
and continuing education courses, to ensure that engineering graduates are
able to:
1.2 That in view of the continuing serious imbalance between the numbers of men and women entering the engineering profession, and the continuing predominance of men in the profession, IEAust, ACED and ATSE take appropriate steps to encourage more women to enter the profession and in so doing to draw particularly upon the resource of women engineers in developing and broadening the culture of the engineering profession to make it more diverse and flexible and inclusive of a wider range of values and attitudes than at present.
3. OUTCOMES OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
UNDERGRADUATE ISSUES
A number of key outcomes that will be required from Australia's undergraduate
system are considered in this and subsequent chapters. They include:
Number of Graduates
The number of undergraduate engineering places in universities is currently
negotiated within universities in relation to other disciplines and between
the universities and Government. The recent proposals by Government for
some full fee paying local students and for differential changes to HECS
amounts have introduced complications, the effects of which are not yet
clear. The HECS changes, if implemented, may discourage potential entrants
into engineering courses. Furthermore the current approach is inherently
fraught with uncertainty because it is influenced by the current employment
paradigm. The recent increased importance of the manufacturing and service
sectors illustrates that we are always chasing new benchmarks. Nevertheless,
by comparison with other developed countries Australia produces fewer engineering
graduates per head of population. If Australia is to remain technologically
competitive with these countries, our engineering activity, and hence need
for engineers, will have to increase. Demand for engineering graduates is
currently strong and there is a growing awareness in some large industrial
corporations that the shortage of well qualified engineers will be a major
limitation to their ability to take up investment opportunities.
The 1988 Williams Review adopted the target of raising the number of engineers
to 1% of the labour force by the year 2000. This target was based on 'considering
the need to raise levels of technology in Australia and the ways in which
engineers could contribute to that objective'. It translated to an increase
of 3% a year in the number of bachelor of engineering commencements. This
led to the recommended target for engineering graduates to the year 2000
shown in Figure 1. Also shown in Figure 1 are engineering graduations since
1986.
Figure 1
(To be included in final report)
To meet targets for graduations, it is necessary to set targets for commencing
students, taking account of completion rates. The Williams Review targets
for bachelor of engineering commencements are shown in Figure 2, together
with actual commencements.
Figure 2
(To be included in final report)
The Williams Review could not have foreseen the rapidly changing global
environment in which Australia now competes. While we can predict with reasonable
confidence Australia's needs for engineering graduates over the next five
years, longer term predictions must be based on projections for future possibilities.
Our universities currently graduate around 4500 professional engineers each
year and a further 2500 engineers immigrate annually. Reliance on immigration
to make good any deficit in the domestic supply will mean that our economic
future will be at risk as migrants may no longer be available in such numbers
when engineering expertise will be in increasingly high demand worldwide.
It will also limit opportunities for our young people. With the rapid growth
and change in technology we need an indigenous provision for life-long learning
in engineering. This too will be put at risk if we rely excessively on overseas
education systems and migration of engineers.
A case for Australia to graduate more engineers was submitted on behalf
of IEAust to a recent House of Representatives Inquiry into the Workforce of the Future (Rice, 1993). A conclusion was that "at present rates of graduation of engineers,
it is unlikely that the manufacturing sector will have the human resources
to increase its R&D activity to a level comparable with that of the average
OECD-member country." The argument was "predicated on an acceptance of the
significance of manufacturing to economic employment; the importance of
R&D as a factor in the competitiveness of manufacturing industry; and the
essential contribution which engineers make to industrial R&D." In this
sense it is consistent with a recently released report from the World Bank
(UNDP Human Development Report 1996) which found that successful countries followed polices that enhanced their
ability to invest and compete in international markets in all sectors, notably
by strengthening the private sector, promoting the application of research
and technology, developing physical infrastructure and encouraging foreign
investment".
It is clear that for Australia to maintain a position among the world's
most developed countries our engineering activity must increase in terms
of both quantity and level of technology. However, it is not clear that
this change can be driven by an increase in the number of engineering graduates.
This is a complex issue, the components of which should be addressed in
a coordinated manner. A substantial increase in the total number of engineering
graduates over the next few years would most likely be counterproductive.
It could lead to significant levels of unemployment, to lowering of entry
standards and to adverse community perceptions of career prospects.
Australia should plan for a significant increase in the number of engineering
enrolments a decade from now. In the shorter term no more than a slight
increase is appropriate. Higher priority should be given to improving the
quality of the present numbers graduating in terms of their preparation
for the range of employment needs. In particular, improved diversity of
courses should provide for Australia's need for engineers who will advance
our industrial activity through leadership and R&D excellence. it should
also provide for engineers who will strengthen the nation's performance
in SMEs and in the more mundane aspects of engineering activity such as
the first level of factory management.
Another argument for a short-term pause in the growth of engineering enrolments
is the potential to improve retention and completion rates through improved
quality of student intake, course design and teaching and learning techniques.
Furthermore, it should be recognised that science graduates are increasingly
being employed in 'engineering activity', for example, software and environmental
engineering.
The collection of employment data in order to make projections of future
need for graduates as has been done by some previous reviews relies too
much upon existing unsatisfactory conditions. It does not take account of
the major changes taking place, and the present Review has not taken this
path. Later in this report we advocate a broadening of the engineering role
and the education of more widely capable engineers, including many who may
enter careers not presently associated with engineering. It would make no
sense to argue that engineering is not contributing to the economy as much
or as widely as we would wish, and then be bound by predictions based on
current conceptions of the engineering role.
RECOMMENDATION 2
2.1 That student numbers entering engineering schools at least be kept at
present levels for the immediate future provided that the quality of new
enrolments can at least be maintained.
2.2 That measures are taken by the universities to ensure that there is
an early improvement in the quality of new enrolments. (See also recommendation
8)
2.3 That Government and the universities continually monitor the demand
for graduates and allow for an increase of enrolments during the first decade
of next century to provide for expected growth in engineering activity and
associated research and development which will be necessary if Australia
is to maintain a strong position among the world's developed countries.
2.4 That a study is made of the proportion of local to overseas entrants
to courses to ensure that the number of graduates available to meet demand
in industry in Australia is not unduly reduced by overseas graduates returning
to their countries.
2.5 That the intake of migrant engineers is carefully monitored to ensure
that numbers admitted can be gainfully employed and are at an appropriate
standard, but that they are not admitted in such numbers as to reduce the
demand for local graduates.
Graduate Attributes
The Review Committee has consulted widely on the attributes needed in Australia's
graduate engineers. Current engineering students were asked to develop a
profile of the ideal engineering student for the year 2010. Their general
response was that their future counterparts will be environmentally, economically
and globally aware, professional problem solvers, computer literate and
with the ability to seek out information for themselves. These students
of 2010 would also be enthusiastic life-long learners with management and
interpersonal skills, and be holistic thinkers, while having core mathematics,
problem solving and design skills.
Importantly, the students interviewed wanted to see the qualities and values
they believe engineers should possess reflected in the educational curriculum
- qualities of responsibility, honesty, an ethical approach, analytical
abilities, innovation and creativity. They want to be perceived as informed,
rounded, educated individuals, able to think and act flexibly and be good
communicators. Engineering students seem to be looking to the education
system to dispel some of the negative impressions prevalent in the community.
(Community perceptions are addressed in Chapter 5 of this report.)
This idealism of young students is substantially consistent with the projected
needs of a wide range of employers of engineers. 'Industry' stresses the
importance of graduates having sound science and engineering fundamentals,
teamwork, communication and learning skills, an understanding of the world
around them, and an innovative attitude. However, industry leaders emphasised
that there are many diverse components of industry with differing needs
and attitudes and that the Review Committee could not expect a consistent
response in terms of graduate attributes in future engineers. For example
the minerals sector will seek in graduates a broad-based education and a
good basic knowledge in fundamentals. Detailed skills in the application
of knowledge will continue to be learned 'on the job'. The consulting engineers
of the future will need to be acutely alert to socio-economic changes, capable
of responding rapidly, and able to operate comfortably throughout the world.
Small to medium enterprises (SMEs) are likely to require graduates who are
more immediately useful.
A recurring message from large companies is that engineering is about wealth
creation in a competitive world, so engineers must understand early the
context in which they function - economics, finance, accounting, teamwork,
and competition, while not losing sight of the need for technical excellence
and for environmental responsibility. Each graduate will need to be strong
in the engineering science of at least one discipline area.
The large numbers of engineering graduates per head of population quoted
for countries such as Japan and Germany can be misleading because in those
countries many engineers go into what Australians regard as mundane engineering.
However in this country there is a resistance in some areas of manufacturing,
especially in SME's, to the employment of engineers at the first level of
management.
In the future it can be expected that there will be a reduction in the number
of first level managers who come directly from a trade background. Some
will come from the courses leading to the degree of Bachelor in Technology
who may have a more practical approach in a specialised area. Others may
come from full professional courses. The education system resulting in graduates
who become members of the Institution of Engineers Australia entitled Engineering
Associates has not been given particular attention in this Review.
The diversity of types of engineering graduates for Australia's future needs
will be the outcome of a range of distinctly different engineering programs.
The Review Committee has, however, identified the following guiding principles
that should be available to engineers for the next century:
For the purpose of accreditation of future engineering courses, the Review
Committee has received the clear and simple message that the following broad
attributes are necessary in engineering graduates:
a) That Bachelor of Engineers courses produce graduates having the following
broad attributes:
b) That IEAust and ACED work together to ensure that courses in schools
of engineering develop those attributes in graduates and that they form
the base for the accreditation of courses.
The Review also recommends that the IEAust and ACED work together to ensure
that the accreditation of Bachelor of Engineering courses is based on the
demonstrated ability to produce graduates with these attributes.
Methods of measuring the attributes and capacities of graduates have been
addressed in an IEAust study (Wragge & Whitehead 1995) in which outputs
as opposed to inputs have been considered. This study also discusses the
greater involvement of engineering schools in the accreditation process.
The Review supports the continuation of this investigation including self-accreditation,
in keeping with the spirit of self-regulation of the engineering profession.
Academic staff should be encouraged to take initiatives and not regard the
accreditation process as one which will stifle innovation. Accreditation
panels must not fall back on outdated attitudes and practices.
RECOMMENDATION 3
That the Deans through ACED and in consultation with IEAust reconsider undergraduate
engineering courses starting immediately in order to:
i address the significant changes facing the profession including globalisation,
information technology, environmental sustainability, and bio-technologies;
ii ensure as a generic requirement that all bachelor of engineering courses
include basic science, engineering fundamentals, management and business,
ethics, with attention to social, environmental, political and economic
context, appropriately integrated to provide a broad base relating to engineering
practice in a social context;
iii provide choices in their courses leading to broad based generalist degrees
or degrees providing preparation for specific specialisations which may
lead to postgraduate specialist courses;
iv include 'sustainable development' as an important component of engineering
courses to ensure that graduates have an understanding of the future as
well as the present needs of society in terms of resource deployment, technological
development and organisational change;
v result in a diversity of courses across the engineering education system
relative to the particular balance of general and specialised material from
school to school, taking into account the needs of industry and requiring
local and national collaboration between schools
vi encourage a balance within courses between engineering practice and engineering
science to ensure that the importance of practice is understood and take
appropriate account of the need for students who follow an engineering science
stream to meet additional requirements for full professional accreditation;
and
vii ensure the development of capability in the following three areas: sound
science and engineering fundamentals, communication, and teamwork and learning
skills.
Broadly-Based Courses
Industry representatives have told the Review that there is need for a genuine
diversity of bachelor of engineering graduates for a range of current and
future roles. A typical categorisation of these roles from which eventual
leaders in business, industry, academe and society will emerge:
These different career directions may not be fully serviced by bachelor
of engineering courses. Some elements may be more effectively pursued through
postgraduate study and/or career experience. These categories should not
be seen as having a particular hierarchy of importance as it is critical
to the future of engineering, and of the nation, that we attract young people
of the highest ability into all of these roles, that the roles are reflected
in curriculum provision and that they are promoted by our leading engineering
schools. Resource limitations will preclude some individual engineering
schools from offering specialised first degree courses addressing each of
these career roles. Consequently, the initial education of all engineers,
whatever their ultimate role, should be more broadly-based than at present.
For example, it should be seen as counterproductive to educate young researchers
with no appreciation of the context in which their research will be conducted,
or of the implications it may have for serving society.
We conclude that policy on engineering education should be designed to promote a wider engineering
role. Policy should support the notion of engineering education as preparation
for a variety of career options, and not be bound by workforce projections
based on traditional engineering employment patterns. In developing their
missions and direction statements, engineering schools should give explicit
attention to the human and economic context of engineering, and to how they
can contribute to enhancing the perception and the practice of engineering
in Australia and internationally. (We note the availability of valuable
new material to support this approach, eg., the text Engineering & Society - An Australian Perspective (Johnston et al., 1995).)
Specialisation and Generalisation
We have argued for a broadening of the base of undergraduate engineering
courses. One of the historical strengths of engineering graduates in this
country has been their broad foundation and relative lack of early specialisation.
Accordingly, they have been seen to be very flexible in industry.
The Williams Review made a number of recommendations to improve and broaden
undergraduate curricula. The recommendations focused on the need to improve
the communication skills of both students and staff, the need for more emphasis
on the treatment of engineering as part of the business context, the need
for better links between science and engineering in first year programs,
and the need for more involvement of the students themselves in providing
feedback on curricula and teaching and learning problems. In their review
of the impact of the Williams Review, Caldwell et al. (1994) reported modest
but not dramatic advances in these areas, despite the enormous extra demands
placed on staff members' time from research pressures and deteriorating
staff/student ratios.
Faced with the emergence of new disciplines and specialisations, and with
relatively inflexible course structures and a need to present a modern image
to prospective students, engineering faculties have recently moved to offer
a range of new, specialised bachelor courses, often with direct entry in
first year. Some of these are crossing conventional discipline boundaries
and stimulating interdepartmental collaboration.
There is now a proliferation of undergraduate engineering degree programs
(currently 182 accredited engineering undergraduate degrees from 36 universities)
in a national system where student numbers entering engineering are declining.
Entry scores have been reduced in many of these courses in an attempt to
maintain the total student numbers and hence the financial income to the
universities. Additional pressure on engineering schools is coming from
science departments that are under similar financial pressure and are converting
some of their programs into materials, environmental, resource and electronic
engineering programs.
The trend in course development, with a few exceptions, is one of increasing
specialisation. Members of the engineering profession have expressed concern
to the Review that many degrees now involve excessive early specialisation.
The opportunities for students to elect to broaden their education beyond
engineering is limited in most four-year bachelor of engineering courses,
and virtually non-existent in many.
We conclude that a strong base of fundamentals in science and engineering
is essential in engineering courses. However, subsequent building on that
base should not be too narrowly specialised because (a) there is not enough
time, (b) students generally need a broad experience, including employment,
before deciding on their ultimate specialisation, and (c) specialisation
is better gained when an employment need is determined. Time must be available
in undergraduate courses for students to develop learning skills and an
understanding of the world around them.
Engineering Practice and Engineering Science
There is a conflict at the core of engineering education, between the engineering
science and the engineering practice components. While engineering science
is dealt with reasonably well by the current universities within the limitations
of their human and physical resources, there is the need to lift our capability
in this area. It is essential for viable groups of academics within the
Australian university system to be working at the cutting edge of engineering
science as it relates to engineering practice and to emerging technologies.
The history of education in engineering practice has varied over recent
years. In the 1950's it was at the heart of university courses but subsequently
was given less emphasis. It was central to the CAE courses in the 1960's,
having less importance in some as they became, or joined, universities.
While there has been a tendency to include engineering practice in the general
area of management there is now a need to understand better the complex
and subtle relationships of practice action and decisions to underlying
knowledge, previous experience and the ability to make good judgements.
( see Donald Schon The Reflective Practitioner).
The Review Committee sees the need for bachelor of engineering courses that
meet both the traditional accreditation criteria in terms of a mix of engineering
science and engineering practice, and some predominantly engineering science
courses. We support accreditation of the latter type of course with the
understanding that employers and IEAust will require an appropriate, and
possibly longer path after graduation to attain full profession status.
Elite Courses
We have argued for an accreditation system that encourages a diversity of
types of bachelor of engineering courses across the engineering education
system. Diversity must also include 'elitism' in some engineering schools
if our system is to be internationally competitive. By 'elitism' we mean
courses of the highest international standard that challenge our most able
students.
RECOMMENDATION 4
4.1 That IEAust, in close formal collaboration with ACED, develop for implementation
in the year 2000 a new accreditation system for the revised undergraduate
engineering courses, which:
i gives recognition to the significant changes facing the profession and
to the critical and distinctive attributes of engineers for the future;
ii ensures compliance with the requirements for courses as set down in Recommendation
3;
iii stimulates innovation, experimentation, diversity and quality assurance
both in courses and their delivery;
iv is receptive to new and emerging technologies;
v includes assessment of the performance of academic staff members;
vi ensures the development of an inclusive engineering education culture
which takes account of and includes the values and attitudes recommended
in the National Position Paper for Women in Engineering.
(Note: ABET Engineering Criteria 2000 will provide a valuable advisory source.)
4.2 That visiting panels for the accreditation of schools be constituted
to include industry representation.
4.3 That IEAust and ACED as a matter of urgency, establish a working party
to canvass the problems which engineering schools foresee in the introduction
of a revised accreditation system, as this relates to students and staff,
and propose the means of managing the transition in ways which do not disadvantage
present students or present staff and which maintain career paths for staff
members with research strengths.
Sustainable Development
The Review Committee has drawn on the report, Guiding Principles for Sustainable
Development and Engineering Education, recently produced by ATSE (1996)
and we have incorporated the intent of one of its recommendations in Recommendation
3. Quoting from the ATSE report,
'The current living standards in developed nations cannot be sustained indefinitely.
They are unsustainable unless humanity imposes constraints on overstressed
life support systems and introduces sustainable development using advanced
technologies and technological sciences and makes use of experience gained
in relevant social sciences. Therefore sustainable development must be embraced
by education in general and particularly by education in engineering and
applied science.
There is a need to broaden the horizons of conventional engineering education.
A more holistic approach must be adopted for the study of engineering subjects
as distinct from the general 'end of pipeline' treatment, which leads to
an expansion of established subjects as well as a number of new background
courses that have to be introduced.'
POSTGRADUATE ISSUES
Coursework Programs
Quality outcomes from postgraduate engineering education will be essential
to Australia's economic development and to provide for the changing needs
of graduates in the workforce. They will also become more important in the
context of professional registration. The Review Committee sees positive
signs of development in the present system, due no doubt to the much greater
extent to which postgraduate education has been deregulated and exposed
to market forces, in comparison with the highly constrained undergraduate
system. Flexibility to meet future needs is developing through the educational
programs associated with Cooperative Research Centres (CRCs) and Advanced
Engineering Centres (AECs), and through the ability of universities to set
fees.
The Review Committee has argued for a broadening of first-degree courses.
This will necessitate the increased use of postgraduate study to enable
graduates to obtain the specialist skills needed for the particular needs
of organisations or for individuals' career development. The traditional
concept of coursework Masters courses with a broad discipline base will
not satisfy this need. Providers will have to focus their offerings on clearly
identified markets and niches.
The future of placing formal values on postgraduate awards, is unclear.
The speed with which organisations must prepare for business opportunities
and the increasing number of career changes an individual will make in the
future, point to expanding markets for modularised continuing professional
education programs that are packaged with modes of delivery to suit the
customers. Innovative approaches are also opening up possibilities for continuing
professional education modules to be credited towards postgraduate awards.
Another emerging facet of engineering education is the growth of private
providers in the area of continuing education and postgraduate qualifications.
These include several of the professional bodies associated with engineering.
This competition to the engineering schools in a presently limited market
presents a challenge and opportunities for future collaboration.
We envisage an expansion of specialised postgraduate engineering education
into the next century. The traditional coursework Masters programs, now
largely out of favour, will be replaced by a new range of 'professional'
Masters, Postgraduate Diploma and Graduate Certificate programs. Issues
of mode of delivery, international marketing and sharing of resources are
addressed later in this report. This expansion will be needed to keep our
engineering workforce and technology at the cutting edge, and so must draw
predominantly on teaching staff with active involvement in research or advanced
consulting.
We conclude that all engineering schools (excluding those organisations simple engaged
in the provision of packaged courses) should have a postgraduate and/or
research involvement which gives relevance to postgraduate coursework and
informs undergraduate programs. A consequence is that research funding should
be accessible to staff in all engineering schools, under suitable competitive
conditions which give due recognition to the excellence and relevance of
proposals, and to demonstrated potential and track record. In this context,
definitions of engineering research should be broadened to include the human,
economic and interdisciplinary aspects of engineering, as well as the scientific
and technological.
We further conclude that Deans should give priority to providing continuing professional education
and postgraduate coursework to address specific needs of graduates and employers.
Collaboration between schools where appropriate, and innovative modes of
delivery should be developed.
Research Programs
Academe is being challenged to accept a much more inclusive definition of
research. In the penetrating and provocative Scholarship Revisited, Boyer
(1990), former President of the Carnegie Foundation in the United States,
highlights the relatively recent phenomenon of focusing on research (as
discovery) almost to the exclusion of other aspects of scholarship in assessing
the work and hence tenure and promotion prospects of academics. This is
occurring in all universities in the United States, not solely in research
universities. In many universities engineering research has become synonymous
with engineering science. There has been little investigation into engineering
practice or processes. Practice is a complex, speculative and less predictable
venture than portrayed by the concept of technical rationality. It is a
profoundly human activity. Much research in engineering schools deals principally
with the relatively straightforward, tractable technical problems. Those
messy, 'hard to get a handle on' issues that practitioners daily confront
are by and large ignored. Australia needs PhDs who can work at the leading
edge on applied projects.
Research culture can also embrace the practice of engineering. Engineering
research should not be limited to the natural phenomena on which technologies
are built, but include the process of engineering. Such studies can become
an integral and natural part of the research profile in engineering schools.
They should be conducted by consortia of researchers drawn from many disciplines
including law, education, philosophy, history and sociology, and leading
to deep new insights into the conduct of the art of engineering. Greater
contributions in engineering can come from the synthesis of existing knowledge
across discipline boundaries; the scholarship of 'integration' in Boyer's
terms. The scholarship in teaching, including the development and evaluation
of innovative teaching or assessment methods, should also become an accepted
part of the profile in an engineering school.
The graduate research student will remain a vital member of the community
of scholars. An important outcome of research activity in universities is
a body of graduated students with a mastery of their field of study and
importantly, a deep appreciation of the relationship of their field to the
wider societal and historical context. A primary aim is the nurturing of
future leaders in industry, government and education. Wrongly, the PhD has
become associated with a narrowing, bounding, even debilitating educational
experience. The opposite should be true. Increasingly it will be seen as
a broadening, empowering experience. This does not signal the need for a
new technology or professional-oriented PhD. Rather, it calls us to return
to the original spirit of the PhD, which was to demonstrate mastery of a
particular field of scholarship, based on rigorous inquiry, while undergoing
supervised research training and leading to original outcomes and further
original research.
Australia has by and large followed the British 'master/apprentice' style
in PhD programs. In the emerging era of large PhD enrolments in some universities,
especially of international students, the approach used in the United States
system in which a core of coursework is used effectively to ensure fundamental
excellence and an element of broadening will also be used.
The future of doctoral programmes is an important issue which will demand a careful study by ACED of the need for, and the validity of, a range of different approaches. These will include the traditional PhD, coursework subjects of variable number as a part of a proramme (but not to lengthen programmes); professionally oriented PhD's or Doctorates of Technology, in addition to higher doctorates.
4. INTERNATIONALISATION AND COMPETITION
We began this report by highlighting the forces of internationalisation
and competition that are reshaping Australia. The end of the Cold War and
the emergence of the competitive global economy have particular significance
for engineering education. The 1988 Williams Review stressed the central
role engineers play in economic growth, and the importance of this role
has not diminished. However in a number of recent reports the terms 'science
and technology' and 'research and development' have been used without acknowledging
the essential role of engineering in these areas. Engineering will play
an important role in wealth creation by developing new engineering services
which add value to our traditional rural and mineral products and by helping
to develop the manufacturing sector.
We must emphasise to all those concerned with engineering education, Government
in particular, that we cannot think of 'growth' in Australia's engineering
activity without 'growth' in our system of engineering education. We use
the term 'growth' not in a simple quantitative sense but in the sense of
being proactive in transforming basic values, addressing emerging technologies,
embracing new principles and techniques of teaching and learning, and seeking
out new markets and partnerships. There are examples of innovation in our
engineering schools, especially in the newer universities. Nevertheless,
our undergraduate system of engineering education is somewhat stagnant,
and has become inflexible, not helped by the funding methods and standards
which currently exists. Substantial rethinking of engineering education
is taking place in the United States, Canada, Germany and Britain, to name
just a few of our competitors. We cannot sit back and take no action especially
as we become increasingly engaged in the global economy.
International competition will impact on engineering education in a number of ways:
NUMBER, SIZE AND CHARACTERISTICS OF SCHOOLS
With the inevitability of Australia's engineering education system entering
the spotlight of international competition against large overseas universities
and international groupings of universities, the Review Committee has given
lengthy consideration to the number, size and characteristics of our future
engineering schools.
In a country with Australia's population we should ask if it makes sense
to have some thirty-six engineering schools all trying to cover much the
same range of activities, and to cover these activities more or less independently.
Should they be reduced in number, combined into groupings, or separated
into different categories? If so, should this be brought about by Government
decree or through market forces?
By contrast, European countries tend to have much smaller numbers of larger
schools - the Netherlands, with a similar population to Australia, has three.
Typically also, European countries (Germany, Sweden, France) have two or
more categories of engineering schools, although the classifications vary.
In all these countries, the technical or specialist university in engineering
and other disciplines is common - but these specialist universities generally
admit students from a much higher level of liberal education than is normal
in Australia, and often interweave such an emphasis into their curricula.
The Australian pattern is more typical of English-speaking countries including
the United States, Canada, and Britain. In the United States there is a
wide spectrum of sizes, characteristics and funding arrangements. In Canada
the picture is similar to Australia, and the American and Canadian reviews
of engineering education have raised very similar issues to the present
Review. In Britain as in Australia, a former binary system has been converted
to a unified system - now undergoing severe financial strictures and forced
rationalisation into different levels of research 'recognition'.
Perhaps not every university should have an engineering school, just as
not every university has a medical school. The trend, however, has been
the opposite, and nearly every university that has not traditionally had
an engineering school has now opened one. As in the English-speaking world
generally (though with some notable exceptions) the Australian notion of
a university has been that of an institution in which a wide variety of
disciplines co-exist and interact. If we were to move to fewer and larger
engineering schools, then clearly some universities would not have engineering
schools at all; and in others, engineering would become a more prominent
institutional focus. This might form part of a trend towards more highly
specialised or even single-discipline institutions, which some futurists
see as the likely pattern in twenty years time.
Perhaps the problem is not one of too many engineering schools per se, but
of too many all trying to cover the same range of activities. Should there
be different categories of engineering school and/or different categories
of university? The following sections examine these propositions in turn.
Number and Size
What are the arguments in favour of fewer and larger schools? Why should
it matter whether a given number of students are accommodated in (say) thirty
small schools or eight large ones? Arguments include:
New technologies: New technologies and fields of engineering development are continually
emerging. Australian engineering schools are too small to be able to put
significant resources into a new field in a reasonable timeframe. Major
European engineering schools, for example, may be ten times larger than
Australian schools, and work in closer collaboration with industry. The
natural rate of staff turnover, together with industry relationships, allow
teams to be established and professors recruited in new fields at relatively
short notice, and to reach a reasonable volume of activity fairly quickly.
Infrastructure sharing: Most engineering schools are deeply concerned about the impossibility
of keeping laboratory equipment up to date and properly functional. After
a dozen years of pressing Government to recognise this deficiency, it must
now be clear that additional equipment funds are not going to be provided.
Universities must solve the problem themselves, and the only realistic approach
seems to be one of sharing facilities and infrastructure. In time, it may
be possible to involve industry more strongly in funding equipment and facilities.
This is only likely to make sense if it is seen to benefit as many universities
as possible.
Range of course options: Only schools with a reasonably large staff can maintain real expertise
in a wide range of areas, and offer a wide range of undergraduate and postgraduate
options. Similarly, a large student population is needed to support multiple
course offerings.
Research concentrations: There is clearly an argument for concentrating research in advanced technical
areas into groupings large enough to develop a 'critical mass' of activity,
facilities and resources, and interactions with other centres and industry.
Some observers contend that large groups are no more productive than small
ones, but expensive facilities cannot be widely replicated and there is
little doubt that for a given level of investment, facilities can be more
comprehensive and effective if they are concentrated rather than dispersed.
These arguments might seem to point strongly to fewer and larger schools.
Two forms of rationalisation need careful evaluation:
Close, or reduce to feeder status, the smaller regional engineering schools: Most Australians, however, would support the regional university as a
key part of its local community, interacting much more closely with it than
do most universities in larger cities. Most would believe that regional
universities should offer access to the major disciplines, and should do
so as fully-fledged local schools and not as dependents of a remote and
impersonal 'megaversity'. Downgrading of regional schools would encourage
migration to the largest cities, surely a retrograde and politically-charged
step. Besides, several regional schools have developed highly distinctive
and valuable missions.
Combine some metropolitan schools: Each of the capital cities now has three or more independent engineering
schools (Canberra has two and ADFA attached to the University of NSW), and
the justification for their separate status might well be questioned. How
might they be amalgamated? It is difficult, but not impossible, to imagine
one major university in Sydney, for example, surrendering its engineering
school to another university in Sydney, or a university in Melbourne surrendering
its engineering school to another. Presumably, such moves would entail physical
relocation of all facilities to the host campus. To make logical sense,
this would seem to require compensating transfers of other disciplines in
the opposite direction - say, all engineering to one and all science - or
all arts - to the other. That is unlikely to happen!
Alternatively, we may contemplate all metropolitan universities surrendering
their engineering schools to new, single-discipline institutions which might
draw on the surrounding universities for some services.
What might be achieved by such amalgamations? If we were to combine all
the present engineering schools into one major institution in each of Adelaide,
Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney, would each of these undertake
research and advanced teaching in all fields of engineering, and would the remaining regional schools be confined to
a secondary role? Or should the aim be to establish super-institutions in
Melbourne and Sydney only, and 'regionalise' all the others?
Except in the last case, the Review Committee suggests that even if the
metropolitan schools, or subsets of them, were combined in this way, none
of them could expect to attain research eminence in every field. Critical
mass concentration in any particular field will only be feasible in one
or two schools, and not in the others. This means that, if schools are to
offer a reasonably broad engineering education, they need staff who are
expert in a wider range of areas than those covered by their leading research
concentrations. Consequently, even in the most prestigious schools, some
staff will not be engaged in leading-edge research, at least on their own
campus. In the light of the recommendations to be presented later about
staff profile and mix of strengths and interests, this is a happy conclusion,
not a shortcoming.
Given that even in the largest institutions, it will not be feasible or
desirable for advanced research to be supported in all fields, the argument
for wholesale amalgamations recedes somewhat in importance. Obviously, however,
some schools will have the will and capacity to support advanced research
in a number of areas, and others in fewer areas or even none.
The preferred staff profile and program mix of a large engineering school,
then, will cover a reasonably wide range of engineering fields and applications.
It will have a strong research profile, but concentrated in certain areas,
and not uniform in all areas. In any particular field, staff interests may
be in long-range fundamental research, in applied, industry-collaborative
research, in consultancy or professional practice. This mix will vary widely
from one field to another. For example, the manufacturing group may be a
leading research concentration (or part of one), while the telecommunications
group may be oriented towards industry and community interaction. Some staff
will have interests specifically in areas of technology and society and
of engineering practice, and some will be heavily involved in engineering
courses for students of other disciplines. All of these activities should
be valued by the institution, and seen as critical to its balanced presentation
of engineering as a discipline and profession.
We conclude that there is some case for a move towards fewer and larger
metropolitan engineering schools, and we have doubts about the viability
of some of the smallest regional schools unless they address niche markets.
However, we do not see a case for forced mergers or closures. Where it has
merit, rationalisation could come about through perceived advantage rather
than decree. The merits of networking of schools be should be explored (addressed
in Chapter 6).
RECOMMENDATION 5
5.1 That universities individually consider the viability of their engineering
schools in terms of their local circumstances, context, performance, quality,
and opportunities for effective merging, networking using modern technologies,
and sharing of resources.
5.2 That the Divisions of IEAust assist at a local level by convening fact
finding task forces jointly with the local deans and local industry to gather
information about the local circumstances and context which will assist
the Deans in the consideration of the viability of their courses and in
evaluating the possibilities of networking and sharing of resources.
Categories of Engineering School
One view put to the Review Committee was that Australia must move towards
categories of universities (and engineering schools) similar to those found
in the United States - the regional universities, the 'state' universities,
and 'the great research universities'. Parallels like this are usually misleading.
The implication is that the American system was designed in the way we now
see, and the characteristic attributes of the categories referred to were
part of some grand concept. This is not how it happened. The characteristics
of American institutions as we now see them have evolved over many years
in response to a host of influences, not least a variety of funding arrangements
unlikely to be replicated in Australia.
Nevertheless, the case for different categories of engineering school must
be considered. There could for example be:
One obvious hierarchy could re-emerge - the reintroduction of a binary system
based on research funding. Most likely, this would polarise into research-funded
schools offering four-year or five-year engineering-science degrees and
graduate programs, with other schools confined to generalist, three-year,
or feeder programs. The Review Committee recommends strongly against such
a division, as (whatever its merits) it would be bound to reinforce the
very narrowness of perception that it is imperative to overturn. Further,
if the argument for categorisation is based on the need for larger critical
masses of research activity, this will hardly be furthered by regulating
half of our institutions out of research.
In all the Review Committee's consultations with both academia and industry,
there has been consensus that the approach should not be one of 'building
walls between institutions'. Rather, as appropriate in their particular
circumstances:
Although we recommend against any mandatory division of schools into categories,
there is everything to be said for schools developing their own emphases
and missions and indeed, we see it as both desirable and inevitable that
schools should differ quite widely. This should be seen in the context of
the major transformations taking place in higher education generally.
Advanced Engineering Centres
The Review Committee advocates the establishment of internationally competitive
national centres where expertise and facilities can be assembled on a substantial
scale to support particular sectors of industry. As well as research and
its commercialisation, such centres should cover the full spectrum of interaction
with industry, including technology transfer, consultancy and specialist
education and training courses. The overall objective would be to promote
Australian industrial capability and competitiveness in the field concerned.
The name 'Advanced Engineering Centre', already in use on a limited scale,
would be appropriate.
Advanced Engineering Centres (AECs) should offer specialist education and
training at many levels including research training through industry-linked
doctorates, graduate coursework programs, short courses and modules that
can be taken singly or credited towards formal awards, in-house programs
for industry, advanced-level undergraduate subjects, and courses for technologists
and engineering associates. Most bachelor of engineering programs, however,
would include only minimal exposure to specialisation. As already seen,
the weight of opinion is that undergraduate courses in general should be
broader in nature and scope and should aim to equip graduates to work across
the traditional fields of engineering with a systems focus and a multidisciplinary
outlook.
Relatively small numbers of undergraduates might proceed to higher levels
of specialisation - though not at the expense of the broad scientific and
contextual grounding that should be common to all engineers. One appropriate
mode may be the five-year Masters degree, entering the final two specialist
years from the third year of a normal bachelor of engineering course. Such
candidates might transfer from their original institution to an AEC in their
chosen specialisation - say manufacturing, for example.
There remains (to continue the example) a need for introductory exposure
to manufacturing for many other undergraduates, and it will not be realistic
for all of them to travel to the AEC. More probably, the AEC will be the
source of high-quality courseware for use by other institutions. Those institutions
will need staff able to guide students in their use of such courseware,
and able to facilitate group projects in which manufacturing aspects will
feature. These staff may not be leading-edge researchers and their professional
engagement may take the form of local consulting or practice. However, they
should have access to the AEC, and a constitution should be developed for
AECs which accords associate membership to staff from other universities
with professional interests in the relevant field.
Each AEC should be based at a particular university or at a site convenient
to two or more universities, where its major facilities would be located.
It should make explicit provision to include, as full partners, neighbouring
universities able to contribute to its objectives. In selecting proposals
for funding, preference should be given to those which combine local strengths
in the most productive and enterprising ways. Where appropriate, AECs should
operate with multiple geographic nodes. There should be no impediment to
basing an AEC at a regional university which has strength in the field concerned.
We hasten to add that while the concept of Advanced Engineering Centres
is crucial to improving the international competitiveness of Australia's
engineering, determining new methods of funding such centres with minimum
reliance on public funds must be identified. This is discussed in Chapter
7.
RECOMMENDATION 6
6.1 That IEAust and ACED in conjunction with industry representatives discuss
with Government means of establishing and of financing Advanced Engineering
Centres which will be internationally competitive with world class expertise
and facilities with the objective of promoting Australian industrial strength
and its research and development capability. Such centres would include
contract research and its commercialisation, technology transfer, consultancy
and specialist education and training courses. ( Note: Although at the present time of economic stringency it may be difficult
in the short term for this recommendation to be achieved it is important
for discussion to commence in view of the potential benefit to the economic
well being of the country and to the industries that would participate as
well as encouraging innovation and industry relevance in the engineering
schools. The application of present government policies should be explored
to determine their relevance to the early development of the Centres.)
6.2 That Advanced Engineering Centres be constituted in such a way as to maximise collaboration between universities and to provide for associate membership by other universities and their staff.
Australian engineering has much to be proud of nationally and internationally.
Why is it almost invisible on the public stage? Why are science and technology'
by-words in public discourse, but not 'engineering'? In most developing
countries and many developed ones, engineering is clearly seen as a prestigious
occupation, critical to economic advancement; and engineering education
is regarded as a priority investment. Why not in Australia?
The American Society for Engineering Education Report, Engineering Education for a Changing World (ASEE, 1995) makes the important point that 'Engineering education programs must be relevant, attractive and connected'. In Australia this 'connectedness' between engineering education, the engineering
profession and the community has emerged as one of the most important issues
to be addressed in the shaping of engineering education for the next century.
Community perceptions of engineering and engineering education raise serious
questions as to whether in Australia it is as relevant, attractive and connected as it should be.
A NATIONAL CENTRE FOR ENGINEERING POLICY
Engineers have a long-held belief that the community does not value their
contribution sufficiently. They generally believe that this is due to an
'image' problem arising largely from a public misconception that engineering
is a 'dirty' profession and that engineering and related technologies are
responsible for many of the world's woes.
Engineers also have a misconception that all that needs to be done to 'correct'
this problem is to increase publicity. There is a need to influence community
perceptions as a top-down operation, presenting policy issues in the national
debate so that they can be picked up by the media and move engineering into
wider exposure as a result.
One of the most insidious contributors to marginalising the engineering
profession is the assumption that it is subsumed by science and technology,
and one salient aspect of this is the existence of Centres for Science and
Technology Policy. During the course of this Review it has become apparent
that Australia does not have a high level body that focuses the collective
wisdom of the nation's leaders of industry, the engineering profession and
engineering education on the major, long-term issues and challenges facing
engineering. Engineering education changing and raising of the profile of
the profession in national debate are just two of those challenges. ASTECís
role borders on this but as its name implies, it concentrates more on science
and technology than professional engineering. Government is advised by a
Chief Scientist but there is no national 'Chief Engineer'.
The manner in which a recent review of engineering education was carried
out in the United States is impressive - as a joint project by the Engineering
Deans Council and the Corporate Roundtable of the American Society for Engineering
Education (ASEE). The co-chairs of the Advisory Council were Norman R. Augustine,
Chairman and CEO of Lockheed Martin Corporation and Charles M. Vest, President
of MIT.
Australia's newer and smaller equivalent of ASEE is the Australasian Association
for Engineering Education (AAEE). It is active in promoting dialogue on
engineering education, in bringing overseas experts to Australia and in
disseminating new developments in teaching and learning. It does this through
annual conferences and publication of the Australasian Journal of Engineering Education.
The UNESCO Supported International centre for Engineering Education (USICEE)
based at Monash University, has as its mission 'to facilitate the transfer of information, expertise and research on engineering
education, and in particular to act as a clearing house for the transfer
of information on textbooks, engineering teaching courseware, software,
teaching methodologies and equipment utilised in engineering education from
developed to less developed countries'.
The Review Committee sees an urgent need for a body with a small permanent
core of staff, and funding on a project basis for commissioning the best
people in Australia and overseas to provide research and independent policy
advice on professional engineering policy issues of national importance,
for example, funding of engineering education. It would draw as appropriate
on the expertise of industry, peak industry bodies, ATSE, IEAust, ACED,
AAEE the VET sector and the wider community. The key to the Centre is success
would be strong leadership by industry.
RECOMMENDATION 7
That ATSE and IEAust with the support of industry explore the formation of a National Centre for Engineering Policy as a 'think tank', commissioning the best people in Australia and overseas to provide research and independent policy advice across a full range of engineering issues, including engineering education.
PERCEPTIONS OF ENGINEERING AND ENGINEERING EDUCATION
Engineering education must do more to develop engineering professionals
who have a greater sensitivity to community needs and a preparedness to
work with other groups to achieve more broadly effective solutions to community
needs. There is a long way to go. Engineering education has a distinctive
traditional culture. The following informed criticism received by the Review
Committee might provoke engineering educators to take a fresh look at the
less helpful aspects of their culture.
"A common perception from the outside of engineering student culture is
one of rough (sometimes crude) pragmatists with little tolerance for non-quantifiable
topics. This, or versions of it, tend to be the inheritance of new students,
reinforced by senior students and often by staff. The content and teaching
methods of engineering courses by nature reinforce scientific/pragmatic
approaches and this leaves little time for wider cultural pursuits. I theorise
that there is a self-fulfilling cycle at work. The people who are attracted
to engineering are pragmatically inclined; this is reinforced through socialisation
and education, and thereby diminishes the value in the student's mind of
non-scientific activities and achievements. In the context of this 'oversimplified'
model, the community values the profession as one which offers technological
problem solving by instrumental methods, but with this comes recognition
of a narrowness of view."
The very strength of engineers as pragmatic problem solvers unless properly
placed in a broader context can clearly be seen as a limiting feature.
We conclude that educational programs should recognise and relate to community needs and
issues, and develop in graduates a greater sensitivity and ability to contribute
to the wider social issues of technology implementation.
Within the broader community there are particular sub-groups that warrant
attention.
Schools
Engineering is poorly understood in schools. In 1988 the Williams Review
was cautious about the possibility of meeting student commencement targets
with students of sufficient calibre to prevent a fall in graduation rates.
This caution was justified. Entry cut-off scores to most engineering courses
declined as quotas were increased during the early 1990s. In recent years,
quotas have been held more or less steady, but entry cut-off scores have
continued to decline for most engineering courses.
Our survey of Deans has indicated that the decline in entry cut-off scores
over the last two years (1995 and 1996 entry) has been substantial. Unfortunately,
the use of different tertiary entrance scores across the States, and internal
shifting of quota places between courses, make it difficult to quantify
this decline in a clear way. Some faculties have resisted a lowering of
intake standards at the cost of serious underfilling of quotas. In other
faculties the cut-off scores for engineering are at an all-time low, sometimes
amongst the lowest in their universities, yet it can be argued that engineering
courses are among the most intellectually demanding.
The declining entry cut-off scores are most evident in the newer universities,
although most of the older universities have not been spared. The serious
decline in interest in manufacturing engineering courses will gravely undermine
any national commitment to revitalisation of our manufacturing sector and
SMEs.
In a few universities, enrolment standards have been maintained through
a major shift in student interest towards direct entry into combined degrees
that are five- and six-year combinations of engineering with science, arts,
commerce, business, economics or law. This phenomenon may point to student
demand for a broader base from which to launch their career, thereby keeping
their options open. The career destinations of graduates from combined degrees
is as yet largely unknown because few have graduated, except from the closely
aligned engineering and science combination.
While many very capable and committed students are still choosing to do
engineering, it is not the attractive career option it once was and we need
to look carefully at the underlying reasons for this shift. National imperatives
such as the 'clever country' or increasing value-added and technology-based
exports, focus the attention of current political and business leaders.
However, many young people have different priorities and see the world differently.
Mackay (1995) found young adults (18-25 years) in Australia are 'resistant
to the idea of generalisations being made about them: they are more likely
to be responsive to appeals based on their individuality'.
This does not sit well with the highly prescribed courses of study that
are still typical of most engineering programs. It does accord with the
rising perception of a need to accommodate perceived 'diversity' in current
student cohorts. Their philosophy is described by Mackay (1995) as based
on 'postponed commitment'. This is the result of growing up in a period
of rapid change; hence their 'wait and see' approach. There may be a correlation
with the rise and relative success of double degree programs associated
with engineering over recent years.
Mackay observes that engineering is absent from the language and the imagination
of the community. It simply does not exist for many young people. Engineering
lacks a human persona. There is an absence of a real debate about the impact
of technology that involves engineers talking about whether or not we should
undertake particular projects.
The ASTEC Future Needs 2010 study of young people's attitudes towards science and technology (ASTEC,
1996) found that they thought 'technology alienates people, causing stress and dehumanisation'. On the positive side, young people expressed a preference for 'technology working for people rather than people forced to keep up with
developments in order to succeed'. The ASTEC report makes three recommendations to Commonwealth, State and
Territory Governments and research institutions, with the aim of attracting
more young people to be interested in and to pursue studies and careers
in science and technology. The broad thrust is to provide young people with
general understanding of science and technology and their contribution to
society, and to ensure that the social concerns of girls and young women
are taken account of in future decision making in the areas of science and
technology. We endorse the thrust of the report.
We conclude that there is more important work remaining to be done, probably
by way of a funded study by an appropriate expert, to provide engineering
educators with understanding of the attitude, values and aspirations of
high school students in the context of engineering as a possible career.
The engineering profession and engineering education, with increased commitments
by Deans, need to develop and maintain partnerships at many levels with
school-age students, with teachers, with schools and with school systems.
The goals of these partnerships should be to:
Improve current perceptions among school students of the engineering profession
and those practising it by presenting engineering as a wealth-creating,
people profession that leads to positions of leadership in a changing world;
Increase the number of school students wishing to pursue careers in engineering by:
Ensure a high level of contribution by the engineering profession to debates
on the curricula of schools, especially in the teaching of mathematics.
There is a need for effective strategies at local, State and national levels in order to achieve these goals. A comprehensive list of proposed strategies is in the report of Task Force 6 (Volume 2 of the Review Report). When making decisions on appropriate strategies, it is important to consider at what ages students are forming their opinions and making decisions about which careers to enter. There are strategies which should be employed with primary schools and others with junior
