Engineering education research is the field of inquiry that creates knowledge which aims to define, inform, and improve the education of engineers. It achieves this through research on topics such as: epistemology, policy, assessment, pedagogy, diversity, amongst others, as they pertain to engineering.
History and background
Engineering education research gained visibility during the 1980s, although the formal education of engineers in the United States traces back to as early as 1802, with the establishment of the United States Military Academy at West Point for the purpose of training the U.S. Army's corps of engineers. The Rensselaer School (now Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) was founded in 1824 and conferred degrees in civil engineering upon four students in 1835.
Spurred by concerns of national competitiveness and the insufficient number of graduating engineers the Neal Report called for research to improve teaching and learning in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) fields.
Similar to other disciplines, the 1990s brought a focus on the scholarship of teaching as demonstrated by the 1995 NRC Report, "Engineering education: Designing an adaptive system", influenced by Ernst Boyer. This focus was primarily motivated by the need to improve the quality of engineers produced by universities in the US. Additionally, 1993 marked the relaunch of the Journal of Engineering Education, which served as a clearinghouse for scholarly research.
As concerns regarding globalization and the need for innovation increased during the late 1990s and 2000s, engineering education research was influenced by calls of reform to produce the quantity and diversity of engineers needed to address global problems.
Continuing the development of the field, centers for engineering education research emerged in the early 2000s. The National Academy of Engineering formed a Committee on Engineering Education in 1999, the academy's Center for the Advancement of Scholarship on Engineering Education was established in 2002 and the Center for the Advancement of Engineering in 2003.
During the mid-2000s, dedicated funding, specialized publications, centers for research, academic preparation and conferences which connected the distributed community supplied the infrastructure necessary for the burgeoning field of research.
Influential Reports on the History of Engineering Education
Mann, C. (1918). Study of Engineering Education
Wickenden Report: Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education. (1930). "Report of the Investigation of Engineering Education 1923-1929." Pittsburgh, PA. L.E. 1995. Report of the American Society for Engineering Education Committee on Evaluation of Engineering Education. Washington, DC: American Society of Engineering Education. “Green Report”. 1995. Engineering education for a changing world. Washington, DC: American Society for Engineering Education. A report prepared by Engineering Deans Council and Corporate Roundtable.
Core research areas
The 2006 Report of the Steering Committee of the National Engineering Education Research Colloquies outlined the 5 key topic areas of engineering education research as follows:
Engineering Epistemologies: Research on what constitutes engineering thinking and knowledge within social contexts now and into the future Engineering Learning Mechanisms: Research on engineering learners’ developing knowledge and competencies in context. Engineering Learning Systems: Research on the instructional culture, institutional infrastructure, and epistemology of engineering educators. Engineering Diversity and Inclusiveness: Research on how diverse human talents contribute solutions to the social and global challenges and relevance of our [the engineering] profession. Engineering Assessment: Research on, and the development of, assessment methods, instruments, and metrics to inform engineering education practice and learning. There are various doctoral-level (PhD) programs in Engineering Education, with primary research conducted in the aforementioned research areas. The American Society for Engineering Education Student Division created an open source workspace with information on engineering and STEM education, which includes a resource page of degree-granting graduate and/or research programs in Engineering Education.