This study examined the extent to which women and men majoring in science, math, engineering, and technology (SMET) fields engaged in a broad array of effective educational practices. Women in SMET fields were generally as, or more, engaged in educationally fruitful activities as their male counterparts. The results of this study, when combined…

Women are under-represented in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) majors and careers in most industrialized countries around the world. This paper explores the broad array of explanations for the absence of women in STEM put forth in the literature of the last 30 years. It is argued that some proposed explanations are without…

While blacks are making modest headway in U.S. undergraduate engineering programs, there are few blacks in graduate engineering programs and, thus, among the nation's engineering faculty. Discusses: nationwide black enrollments in undergraduate and graduate engineering programs; blacks at top-rated engineering schools; universities enrolling the…

The author has developed an innovative science website resource that also shows how engineers use science. As well as addressing scientific facts and concepts, the resource also engages children in the process of scientific enquiry, using graph tools and data interpretation. Part of the resource helps children to understand that much of what they…

In 2001 a large-scale project, the "Breakthrough project", to develop teaching and learning was started at Lund Institute of Technology (LTH), Lund University, Sweden. The project has had a duration of 3 years and the aims of the project were to change the paradigm from teaching to learning and implement a sense of scholarship of…

In 2000 the UK Engineering Professors' Council (EPC) drafted an output standard to describe first-cycle engineering programmes that would prepare students for practice and further professional learning. The standard described what is authentic and worthwhile in engineering education--it identified complex outcomes of learning. This poses practical…

In a project-organized problem-based learning curriculum, students are encouraged to learn through a process where they write questions and find their own answers. Their supervisor has an important function in facilitating this process. When it comes to project assessment, this pattern is often changed to one where the supervisor asks the…

A worldwide problem in Engineering education is the high rates of students' failure and drop out particularly at the beginning of the course. This is related to the process by which students learn Mathematics. An innovative methodology of teaching calculus was developed and it is presented in this paper. The approach, based on both course…

Preoccupied by the fact that the number of women involved in Engineering in Europe is increasing too slowly, a consortium (teams from seven countries) was created in 2001 with the aims to understand why is this the case, and to study means which exist and are effective in attracting women into Engineering training. In particular, an hypothesis was…

Diagnostic testing in mathematics has become a favoured tool at many universities. In this paper we report on a novel method of diagnostic testing which incorporates a paired question approach, with two questions being set on each of 20 different topics. It was introduced at Loughborough University for use with first year engineering students in…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss how long term risk prevention and civil protection may enter in university programs for environmental engineers and urban and regional planners. Design/methodology/approach: First the distinction between long term risk prevention and emergency preparedness is made, showing that while the first has…

One of the purposes of knowledge generation at the higher education level is the creation of expertise. However, the mental structures that an expert uses to process information are not generally considered. Instead, information alone is presented to the learner and it is hoped that he or she will somehow integrate this information into knowledge…

A study is reported that investigates the relationship between career decision status, quantity and quality of work experience obtained by university students. Career decision status is the term used to capture an individual's level of decidedness and comfort with their career decisions and the reasons underlying this state (Jones & Lohmann,…

Engineering curricula are increasingly focused on developing student competencies. Many new competencies needed by engineers today are professional skills (sometimes called the "soft skills"). Among the new competencies for engineering graduates is global competence, the ability to work knowledgeably and live comfortably in a…

Recent research, undertaken using participative observation methods within the Leonardo Da Vinci project "Open-Dynamic-Design", provides evidence that EU industrial practice continues to value the flexibility of physical models across a range of disciplines. This research is placed within the philosophical educational framework…