The Beginnings of Wisdom: Challenges in Engineering Education

What does it take to form an artist? And what forms a great musician? What more does it take to educate an engineer of international standard, who can bring their expertise to bear on the global grand challenges but, what is more, be effective in bringing solutions into being? How do we help our young people to grow, not only in their technical knowledge, but also in their judgment, in wisdom? The UK has a major skills gap opening up with nearly a million engineers and scientific professionals required to enter the economy between now and 2020 to replace those who are retiring and to drive economic growth (source: EngineeringUK). The challenge for engineering educators is not only to enable students to gain technical knowledge and understanding but also to grow in judgment and wisdom. Firstly a few words about the key characteristics of engineers. The Royal Academy of Engineering has undertaken a recent piece of research with the University of Winchester in the UK to identify the key characteristics of engineers. The report, entitled Thinking Like an Engineer: An Active Learning Approach was published by the Academy in 2014 and is available on the Academy website. It highlights six engineering habits of mind—key thinking and practical attributes of engineers (Fig. 1). These are: (1) Problem-finding; (2) Creative problem-solving;