Multiple Perspectives on Engaging Future Engineers

TLDR

Engaging future engineers is a central concern, yet investments to make engineering more engaging have yielded limited impact, prompting a need for community reflection and more effective strategies. The article aims to map a new innovation landscape for engaging future engineers through a theoretically grounded divergent‑thinking approach that expands the space for high‑impact innovations. Using a multiple‑perspectives methodology that draws on innovation, cross‑disciplinary, and boundary‑work frameworks, scholars from diverse communities present interparadigmatic viewpoints, act as boundary agents, and illustrate new opportunities for engineering education innovation. The study proposes an innovation landscape that foregrounds epistemological development, social justice, new configurations of engineering thinking, formative‑year connections, and the intertwining of engineering knowing and being, and recommends adopting multiple‑perspectives strategies and tools to better understand complex engineering education problems.

Abstract

B ackground Engaging future engineers is a central topic in everyday conversations on engineering education. Considerable investments have been made to make engineering more engaging, recruit and retain aspiring engineers, and to design an education to prepare future engineers. However, the impact of these efforts has been less than intended. It is imperative that the community reflects on progress and sets a more effective path for the future. P urpose The purpose of this article is to map a new innovation landscape for what it means to engage future engineers. This is a theoretically grounded divergent‐thinking effort to enable a broader space of high impact innovations for engaging future engineers. S cope /M ethod A multiple perspectives methodology drawing from innovation, cross‐disciplinary, and boundary work frameworks was used to make visible multiple facets of engaging future engineers. Scholars from diverse communities of thought and discourse were selected to present interparadigmatic perspectives, act as boundary agents, challenge and transform current ways of thinking, and illustrate new opportunities for engineering education innovation. C onclusions A new innovation landscape for engaging future engineers is needed, one that emphasizes epistemological development and social justice, new configurations on engineering thinking and connecting to the formative years of development, the entwinement of engineering knowing and being, and mutually informing consequences for opening up a broader space for innovation. We also need to adopt strategies and tools for using a multiple perspectives approach to better understand complex engineering education problems.