ABSTRACT
There is growing awareness that single discipline approaches to engineering problems will not be able to meet the demands of today or the future. Engineering problems have always been complex, but our awareness of this complexity has dramatically evolved. Through developments in technology our world has become smaller, improving our ability to quickly and efficiently connect across the globe and with different disciplines to experience diverse views of the world. Due to these connections, engineers are learning about the need for developing both depth in engineering knowledge and breadth in different kinds of knowledge that shape approaches to complex engineering problems. This is changing ideas about what it means to be an engineer and what it means to prepare engineers for the profession. For example, statements on the future of engineering education in the United States stress goals for preparing engineers to become ‘emerging professionals’ who can deal with complexity, flexibly adapt to new situations, and bridge disciplinary boundaries to integrate technical and non-technical considerations, manage trade-offs between interdisciplinary criteria, and innovate (Bransford, 2007; Jamieson & Lohmann, 2009; National Academy of Engineering, 2004).
