March 2004

In each newsletter, we showcase papers or information that have been written or submitted by IACEE members. This month's item is from Graham Guest, Secretary-General of the European Higher Engineering and Technical Professionals Association (EurEta) in London, England.

Europe - Workplace for competent professionals with CPD by Graham Guest

It is not so long ago that a person joining a company - particularly a large organisation - could expect a job for life. Continuing professional development (CPD) was regarded at best as an optional extra to be undertaken according to the needs or wishes of the individual or to meet some short-term requirements of the company. At worst CPD was felt not to be important and additional training was given at random to use up training budgets or to make staff feel that they were wanted. Today's key messages are that change is not something we can ignore; there is no longer such a thing as a job for life; learning does not stop after initial education and training; and to survive and prosper in the 21st century individuals must take responsibility for themselves and their own CPD.

For the full paper, please click here.

Do you have an interesting project in the field of engineering education that you would like to share with fellow IACEE members? We want to showcase papers or information from IACEE members in this newsletter. To submit articles/items of information, please contact Jennifer Johnson.

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Papers on Continuing Engineering Education

In the field of continuing engineering education, much can be learned from looking outside what your own universities are doing. This month's papers look at how different programs are exploring different international facets of engineering education.

Please click on each title to read the full paper - note that you will need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader installed on your computer to read the files (to download a free copy, click here). If you have a paper that you would like to share with the IACEE community, please contact the newsletter at info@iacee.org.

A German-U.S. Faculty/Intern Exchange Program in Biotechnology
A cosortium for exchange of student industrial interns and academic and industrial expertise in biotechnology and bioengineering education has been established between the NSF-funded VaNTH Engineering Research Center in Bionengineering Educational Technologies and an alliance of universities and trade organization in Niedersachsen, Germany. The purposes of this consortium are...to explore differences in European/US models of bioengineering and biotechnology education and attitudes toward biotechnology development.

Internationalization of Engineering Education in European Pre-Accession Countries: the Polish Case
A new challenge in the education area, especially in engineering, was opened up when the Central and Eastern European Countries joined the free world in 1990. Many elements of education had to be changed with a view to preparing our engineers for entering the European labor market.

A Case-Learning Center for Civil Engineering Teaching and Learning Support
Being one of the most traditional and respected specialities, Civil Engineering (CE) type courses have usually been a favored choice in university curricula. Many universities around the world have been offering CE courses for years, but yet the various approaches to teaching engineering subjects remain largely unchanged. Face-to-face lectures continue to be the most commonly used teaching method to date.

Engineering Education in Developing Countries
It is important to have a basic knowledge of the undergraduate education in developing countries. Information was gathered through visit to several universities and colleges in India, China and Cuba through professional exchange programs. Admission criteria, curricula, examining system and accreditation processes in these countries are different from that of the United States and are addressed in this paper. Related issues such as ABET criteria and financing expensive engineering education in relatively poor countries like China, India and Cuba are also given consideration in this paper.

Experiences with Web-Mediated Teaching at the University of Strathclyde
The approach to teaching and learning has been changing with emerging technologies over the recent past. Web-mediated techniques in particular have been receiving more attention as they suitably combine both aspects of computer-assisted teaching/learning methodologies with the anywhere/anytime access feature of the Internet at the client end. The Teaching Assistant Portal (TAP) is a web-mediated courseware management and delivery tool developed at the University of Strathclyde and has been used in an engineering department.

9th World Conference on Continuing Engineering Education

The 9th WCCEE, sponsored by IACEE and co-sponsored by the Science Council of Japan and the Japanese Society for Engineering Education, will be held in Tokyo on 15-19 May 2004. With the theme of "Strategy of Continuing Engineering Education for International Competence and Cooperation," the conference will address such topics as case studies for CPD, CEE in developing countries, and knowledge management. Please visit the conference website by clicking here.