The Role of Andragogy in Mechanical Engineering Education

As highlighted by ABET mechanical engineering program accreditation criteria, a goal of an undergraduate mechanical engineering program is to prepare undergraduate students to work professionally in thermal or mechanical systems. Correspondingly, a student’s undergraduate experience marks a transition from their formative years as teacher-dependent, full-time students toward an adulthood marked by self-directed learning and full-time employment. To date, undergraduate engineering education literature has oriented on students as young, dependent learners through the use of the term pedagogy to describe techniques and methods of teaching rather than the term andragogy, which refers to educating adult, self-directed learners. A search for the two topics in the Journal for Engineering Education returns 277 articles associated with the term pedagogy compared to 2 for andragogy, for a ratio of over 138:1. For the International Journal of Engineering Education the ratio is 119:1. A similar search of all ASEE conference articles since 1996 returns over 104:1. The initial conclusion of these findings is that the topic of andragogy is less prevalent than pedagogy in engineering education publications. This is problematic considering these two learner orientations bring with them a set of conflicting underlying assumptions regarding the learner themselves, with the pedagogical assumptions less consistent with ABET student outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to provide undergraduate mechanical engineering educators with a better understanding of how andragogy may play an integral role in the education of undergraduate engineering students. The assumptions associated with andragogy may be better suited to preparing students for the rigors of professional mechanical engineering practice. Using a single case study methodology, this paper examines the guiding documents of one undergraduate mechanical engineering program including 1) National level engineering education guiding documents, 2) institution-level guiding documents, and 3) department-level mission and vision statements. Results from this case study analysis contrast the applicability of pedagogical and andragogical assumptions in the education of undergraduate mechanical engineers and highlight how the historically pervasive pedagogical assumptions may hinder the development of students into independent, adult learners. The paper concludes by proposing the use of a continuum to view how pedagogy and andragogy apply across the entire undergraduate mechanical engineering experience as we encourage students to develop into adult, self-directed learners prepared for a life of professional engineering practice. Introduction At the heart of engineering and engineering design is problem-solving. Engineers apply scientific principles to solve problems and design solutions to improve society. It is the role of engineering educators to best prepare engineering students to possess the skills, knowledge, and attributes necessary to succeed as a problem-solver. Throughout engineering education literature, the term pedagogy is used to describe the methods and techniques used in engineering education. The purpose of this paper is to suggest that the very nature of engineering may be better served by an education approach that also incorporates elements associated with the term andragogy, or the education of adults. This work explores the concept of and andragogy and contrasts it with pedagogy. Then, the paper will examine a case study using the Mechanical Engineering program at West Point to determine if the principles of andragogy would best suit the goals and objectives of the program, as stated in governing documents. Background Before discussing andragogy at any length, it is important to review the term pedagogy as a contrast. The term pedagogy is well documented and is described invariably as leading children, from the Greek roots of leading and boy.1 Watkins and Mortimore add that the term has taken on a greater meaning to describe the ‘science of teaching’.1 However, the root of the term remains the idea that the teacher is an adult and the student is a child and needs to be led. Andragogy, on the other hand, is a term that is also rooted in the Greek language and means the leading of ‘man’, or adults.2 Perhaps no discussion of andragogy is appropriate without the mention of Malcolm Knowles. In the 1970s he wrote on the topic and contrasted how the two theories viewed the learner.2-3 The greatest difference between the two was the level of dependence the learner had on the teacher. Knowles describes learners as goal-oriented, activity-oriented or learning-oriented. The goal-oriented learner sees learning primarily as a means to an end, either to attain a degree or perhaps a job. An activity-oriented learner seeks learning as a way to accomplish or engage in some desired activity. Finally, a learning-oriented student sees learning as an end in itself and as a way to increase one’s mental abilities.3 A motivating factor in andragogy literature is the nature of knowledge. Knowles points out that as mankind and technology progress, the turnover of social knowledge is accelerating. Whereas in the past, a person could acquire the knowledge they needed for a lifetime at an early age, the advent of the 20th Century made that concept more and more obsolete.2 One is reminded of the social tale about fishing. In the story, we are told that if we teach a person to fish they can feed them self for a lifetime. However, this is true only if fishing remains a viable activity for one’s lifetime. Metaphorically, andragogy proposes that instead we teach a person to teach them self to fish. The skills developed in learning the process on one’s own will be applicable if fishing is no longer feasible and a person has to teach them self to hunt or raise crops instead for a food source. Merriam summarizes the assumptions of andragogy into five overall categories.4 They are: 1. Concept of the Learner: The learner is independent and can direct their own learning. 2. Role of Learner Experiences: The learner has real-world experiences that they can incorporate into their learning. 3. Readiness to Learn: The learner has a need to learn based on the acceleration of social changes discussed above. 4. Orientation to Learning: The learner sees an immediate application for the learning they conduct. 5. Motivation: The learner is internally, rather than externally motivated. An excellent summary of the five categories above and how the assumptions about each category differ in a pedagogical approach compared to an andragogical approach appears below in Table 1. This table appeared in an online article compared the two approaches. Table 1: Comparison between Pedagogical and Andragogical Assumptions5 To gain a better understanding of the use of the term andragogy, the authors examined the literature surrounding engineering education and scholarly works. The search returns are certainly telling. A simple search on Google Scholar yields 1,230,000 results for pedagogy compared to 28,500 for andragogy, or a 43:1 ratio. An examination in the context of engineering education is more telling. The same search of all ASEE conference articles had an even greater disparity, yielding 4,375 returns to just 42, for a 104:1 ratio. Both the Journal and International Journal for Engineering Education revealed ratios of 138:1 and 119:1, respectively. Clearly, the term pedagogy is much more commonly used in the context of educating engineers. Figure 1 shows the ratio of pedagogicalto andragogical-related publications for various publication outlets. Figure 1: Ratio of Pedagogy to Andragogy References A further exploration of the engineering education articles that discussed andragogy typically fell into one of two categories. In many cases, the term was used almost interchangeably with the idea of project-based learning (PBL). In project-based learning, students solve problems and work on projects and learn or teach themselves topics in pursuit of solving the problem.6 Similar to Knowles’ idea of activity-oriented learning, PBL is certainly a departure from the more traditional view of the student as completely dependent on the teaching of the instructor. However, there was little to no discussion in these articles on how PBL fit into any larger view of the student as a more independent, adult learner. The other category of articles that made mention of andragogy made the connection between the term ‘adult’ referenced in andragogy, and the idea of adult education. Most of these articles discussed different techniques of how to accommodate adult education students to include differences in marital status, financial obligations, time, and proximity to the place of learning. Again, however, these articles failed to specifically address how to incorporate the principles of andragogy into a comprehensive teaching and learning strategy in engineering curriculum. In this work we take a first step toward the incorporation of andragogical learner assumptions by examining their applicability in one mechanical engineering program. Methods Using a single case study methodology, we conducted a comprehensive review of several of the documents that guide not only our engineering program, but also guiding documents of the institution and profession. All of the documents examined in this case study and a brief description are shown in Table 2. The purpose of this examination was to discover mandates within the documents that would favor a teaching and learning approach advocated by andragogy. While the authors recognize that the internal documents are not relevant to an outside audience, it was important to demonstrate how an institution’s governing documents could encourage outcomes and objectives more aligned with the concepts of andragogy, without explicitly acknowledging the value of examining andragogy principles. For the analyses, bo