Pathway to a New Engineering Education Paradigm: The COVID-19 Factor

Abstract

A lot has changed over the last two years in how engineering faculty teach and how their students learn. Engineering educators were contemplating imminent changes in 2019/2020 when the COVID pandemic struck. The discussion was almost two decades old. Social, economic, and developmental factors coupled with advances in technology paved the way for more mult idisciplinary engineering. Engineers have been tackling new problems to solve and more sophisticated systems to design. Globalization meant that they should acquire certain personal, social, and cultural skills. They have to be more aware of the impac t of their work on society and on the environment. Experiential learning, project-based lear ning, and research-based learning became themes of a new engineering education paradigm, the signs of which were emerging on the horizon. Changes in the philosophy, disciplines, and pedagogy of engineering education were under discussion. The demand for these changes varied, however, in terms of their motivation, scope, scale, and implementation from one country to another.