System Engineering Competency: The Missing Course in Engineering Education

This paper addresses the need for and proposes solutions to bolster the competency of the engineering professionals at two levels: 1) strengthen undergraduate and graduate level engineering education to include a robust Systems Engineering(SE) problem solving / solution development course and 2) shift the Systems Engineering paradigm found in many organizations through education and training to employ scalable SE methodologies for projects ranging in size from small to large complex systems. The objective is to educate and train engineers to efficiently and effectively develop systems, products, and services that can be verified and validated as meeting user operational needs and expectations with acceptable risk and life cycle costs within project triple constraints – i.e., technical, cost, and schedule performance. To fill the void, the paper proposes a minimum set of topics required for a Fundamentals of Systems Engineering course and instructor / instructional team qualifications. Universities, colleges, government, and industry often create or procure Systems Engineering courses that may provide necessary but insufficient content for educating and training engineers in concepts, principles, and practices required to achieve system, product, or service development success. The problem is exacerbated by the need for Systems Engineering instructors with industry experience, multi-disciplined systems thinking, and excellent instructional communications skills qualifications.