(Re)Constructing the Professional Formation of Engineers: A Human-Centered Model of Communication Design

Abstract

This study introduced a design-inspired approach to unpack problems of professional formationof engineers: 1) the gap between what students learn in universities and what they practice upongraduation; 2) the perception that engineering is solely technical, math, and theory oriented; and3) the lack of diversity and inclusion (incorporation of difference in perspectives, values, andways of thinking and being engineers) in many engineering programs. The current projectinvestigated the discursive practices and institutional processes that contributed to or inhibitedinnovative and inclusive professional formation within an undergraduate engineering setting.Specifically, this project showed how Grounded Practical Theory (GPT), Communication asDesign (CaD), and Human-Centered Design (HCD) offer alternative pathways to conceptualizethe processes of professional formation.The context for this study involved the professional formation of engineers at a School ofBiomedical Engineering (BME) at a large, Midwestern university. Participants for this studyincluded undergraduate students and faculty, staff, and administration (FSA). Semi-structuredinterview data was collected and explored participants’ descriptions, accounts, and experiencesrelated to professional engineering formation in BME. Data collection included 33 totalinterviews including 15 FSA and 18 student interviews. The study involved an empiricalexamination of discursive practices that invoked, reproduced, and maintained discourses ofprofessional engineering at the BME school.Based on insights gained from the empirical examination of discursive practices, a GPTframework was applied to examine conflicts in professional formation, strategies participantsused to overcome these challenges, and the underlying rationale for these strategies. Specifically, the goal of gaining a broad knowledge base—incorporating expertise across various engineeringand science disciplines—often can come at the expense of realizing specific application andtechnical know-how. For many participants, both goals were critical for becoming a professionalbiomedical engineer but often times blocked a discourse of professional formation that wasinnovative and inclusive. Participants revealed that a standard lecture curriculum influenced thistension, in many cases for the worse. However, findings suggested that strategies for overcomingthese conflicts were by integrating lecture curricula with more active learning formats (e.g.,undergraduate research, lab participation). Moreover, findings showed how standard lecturecommunication designs shaped and maintained a discourse community more likely to emphasizeunderstanding engineering as a science and also gaining a broad knowledge base often times atthe expense of realizing specific application and technical know-how.This study’s analysis offers several theoretical contributions. First, GPT pointed to the deeplyintegrated relationship between the ontological and epistemological foundations of biomedicalengineering professional formation. That is, becoming a biomedical engineer meant havingknowledge of several sets of disciplinary expertise while also understanding when and how toenact this knowledge in practice. Second, professional formation designs for communication(e.g., lecture designs, active learning designs) presupposed something about the recurrentpractices held within the school and how these recurrent practices constituted professionalontology and epistemology in ways that were both enabling and problematic, Third, and from aHCD perspective, exploring designs for communication brought to life the ways participants,through interactivity, actively designed discourses of professional formation in an attempt toachieve and meet their epistemological and ontological goals.