Systems Engineering Education for East Africa

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to explore the need for Systems Engineering (SE) in East African countries and how best to educate engineers in the field of SE. It provides a comprehensive overview on the usefulness of SE education for East African nations and proposes SE curriculum. Presently SE has been given little attention in East African countries. However, these countries are in the beginning of industrialization with many new mega projects and infrastructure expansions that demands SE professionals. This motivates the need to introduce SE education in the region. Systems engineering education demands the development of SE curriculum, which will be multidisciplinary and considers social and psychological factors by taking into account the active participation of the community. Towards this end, the paper demonstrates the necessity of SE education via designing and managing ongoing mega projects. It also proposes SE curriculum by incorporating courses covering both foundations of SE and the practice of SE. Furthermore, it suggests that these courses will be delivered in collaboration with industry and government entities.