Preparing People for Rapidly Changing Environments

The October 2006 issue of the Journal of Engineering Education describes a landmark set of activities called the National Engineering Education Research Colloquies (NEERC) that explored how rapid changes in the world require new ways to educate future generations of engineers. The argument is not simply that we need more engineers than we have had in the past; instead we need a transformation in how we educate future engineers [1]. Many people in the learning sciences have also been exploring the need for educational transformations, and it seems clear that our different research communities have a great deal to learn from one another. Opportunities I have had to work with the VaNTH Bioengineering Center (VaNTH.org; [2]) convince me of the immense value (to me at least) of collaborations such as these. Currently, my colleagues and I in the LIFE Center (Learning in Informal and Formal Environments (LIFE-SLC.org) are finding it useful to juxtapose several research literatures that include: (a) expertise and its development [3–5]; (b) transfer and its implications for assessment [6–7]; (c) change and innovation [8–11]; and (d) design strategies for promoting and managing change [12–14]. The act of juxtaposing these different literatures has generated a number of interesting questions. I discuss five that I hope are useful to raise.