Andrew Jamison, , Morgan & Claypool Publishers, 2013, 153pp, $20 (web site price), , ISBN 9781627051590 (paperback)
This short monograph, one in a series which appears in the Synthesis Digital Library of Engineering and Computer Science, was written by Andrew Jamison who serves as coordinator for the Danish Strategic Research Council's Programme of Research on Opportunities and Challenges in Engineering Education in Denmark. It is presented in seven chapters and is supported by a detailed bibliography.
In chapter one the author sets the scene to support his quest to help engineers ‘make sense of the amorphous quest for sustainable development’. He argues the need for ‘green engineers’ and a ‘hybrid imagination’ that combines scientific knowledge and engineering skills with cultural understanding. He rightly condemns the ‘forces of habitus’ that fights syllabus and teaching changes in institutions that often state a search for new knowledge in their aims and objectives.
Chapter two traces the pedagogical approaches to teaching and learning in engineering education. The emphasis of engineering has evolved to match technological development phases from mechanical and civil to IT and biotechnology. Chapter three focuses on green engineering and questions the success of the current technical emphasis of Denmark's quest for renewable energy. He cites the facts that energy use and carbon dioxide output continue to increase despite the growth in the generation of wind energy. The focus on technical solutions has overlooked the need for the development of a sustainable society. He believes there is a need to revisit the objectives of the environmental movements of the 1970s and reviews how these developed and expressed their concerns.
Chapter four emphasises the education of green engineers and the author overviews the evolution of this education. He expresses the view that, in the quest for sustainable development, there is a particular combination of competences that are called for: linking natural science and social science; engineering and empowerment; ethics with economics; and, not least, environmental concern with professional management.
Chapter five focuses on fostering hybridity and the need to develop engineers with professional scientific and technical competence that are also engaged in and knowledgeable about processes of social and cultural changes. There is the need to educate ‘change agents’ to help guide their fellow citizens towards the sustainable society. He advocates the Aalborg model in which undergraduate programmes are based on a combination of problem and project-based learning with formalised courses playing a supportive role. The objectives of the projects include connecting technical and scientific components of the projects to broader contextual issues through; ‘the story-line of economic innovation’; the story-line of social construction; and the story-line of cultural appropriation.
Chapter six deals with the forces of habitus and the author expresses his concern that, in many fields, a kind of green rhetoric has emerged but usually without any meaningful influence on the actual theory and practice of the academic discipline or professional field as a whole. The chapter contains a case study that highlights some of the problems discussed in the monograph in the context of architectural students in Austin, Texas. It summarises the problem of coordinating the views of different players and stakeholders and the need for a concerted effort to develop a solution without compromising the concept of sustainable development.
Chapter seven presents conclusions that include the need to promote hybridity and collective learning through a cross-fertilisation between the different approaches to engineering education. He cautions that people are suspicious of change and that green knowledge is inherently interdisciplinary.
The monograph charts the journey of an academic from an early recognition of the importance of sustainability to the development of an educational philosophy that acknowledges and contains the variety of knowledge seen in a hybrid approach.
Anyone who has experienced the problems and difficulties associated with ‘greening the syllabuses for engineers and scientists will perhaps better understand the reasons for their frustration by reading this monograph. While many readers may find the first-person writing style and list of accomplishments and acquaintances irritating, there is an informing text that helps prospective teachers of green engineers to understand the context and background to the amalgamation of scientific/engineering principles and social science approaches.
Does this monograph provide a step-by-step guide for a teacher embarking on the greening of engineering? No, it does not. That will remain your problem but you may gain enlightenment and see your task in a different perspective having read this monograph.
© 2013 Allen Clegg