Introducing First Year Civil Engineering Students To Sustainability

As articulated in the Body of Knowledge for Civil Engineering, all civil engineering students should be introduced to the concept of sustainability. The objective of this project was to integrate sustainability concepts into the 1-credit Introduction to Civil Engineering course that first year students are required to take at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Student attitudes about sustainability were evaluated using a written survey and in class questions to which students responded using a Course Response System (clickers). Evidence of student learning on sustainability was acquired via student performance on a homework assignment worth 12% of their overall course grade. Evidence that the students incorporated sustainability into their concept of civil engineering was also collected based on other course assignments. There is some evidence that female and minority students may be more likely to articulate the importance of sustainability in the context of civil engineering, although more research is needed on this topic due to the small numbers of female students in the class.