Engineering Education and Practice

Description

Engineering Education and Practice: Embracing a Catholic Vision is a collection of essays exploring how major themes of Catholic social teaching—respect for the environment, sustainability, technological design, and service to the poor—all positively affect engineering curricula, students, and faculty. Many engineering programs at American universities focus solely on developing technological sophistication without promoting ethical and humanitarian priorities. The contributors to this collection argue, however, that undergraduate engineering education needs to be broadened beyond its current narrow restrictions.

The authors of this unique collection, nearly all of whom are engineers themselves, show how some Christian universities in the United States have found creative ways of opening up their engineering curricula. They demonstrate how the professional education of engineers can be enriched not only by ethical and religious themes, which are typically isolated in humanities curricula, but also by special fieldwork courses that offer hands-on service-learning opportunities and embody a rich educational synthesis.

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• EDUCATION
• Philosophie et théologie
• Higher
• Level
• List of American institutions of higher education
• School
• Catholic
• Christianity
• Christian
• Administration

Informations

• Publié par: University of Notre Dame Press
• Date de parution: 30 novembre 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780268081737
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

Engineering Education and Practice

NOTRE DAME STUDIES IN ETHICS AND CULTURE

series editor, David Solomon

ENGINEERING

EDUCATION

PRACTICE AND

Edited by James L. Heft, S.M. and Kevin Hallinan

Foreword by David J. O’Brien

University of Notre Dame Press Notre Dame, Indiana

Embracing a

Catholic

Vision

Copyright © 2011 by University of Notre Dame Press Notre Dame, Indiana 46556 www.undpress.nd.edu All Rights Reserved

Manufactured in the United States of America

Library of Congress CataloginginPublication Data

Engineering education and practice : embracing a Catholic vision / edited by James Heft and Kevin Hallinan ; foreword by David J. O’Brien. p. cm. — (Notre Dame studies in ethics and culture) Proceedings of a conference held Sept. 22–24, 2005 at the University of Dayton. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN13: 9780268031107 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN10: 026803110X (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Engineering—Study and teaching—United States. 2. Engineers— Education—United States. 3. Engineering—Moral and ethical aspects—United States. 4. Catholic Church—Education. I. Heft, James. II. Hallinan, K. P.

T73.E447 2011 620.0071'173—dc23

2011036539

∞The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durabilityoftheCommitteeonProductionGuidelinesfor Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.

Contents

Foreword D A V I D J . O ’ B R I E N

Preface. Elegant Design Is Not Enough: Embracing the Tangled “We” to Critique Technology J O H N S T A U D E N M A I E R , S . J .

Acknowledgements

Introduction J A M E S L . H E F T, S . M . , A N D K E V I N H A L L I N A N

P A R T 1 . T H E S H A P E A N D A R T O F E N G I N E E R I N G A N D T H E C A T H O L I C T R A D I T I O N

Chapter 1 Exploring a Catholic Vision of Engineering J A M E S L . H E F T, S . M .

Chapter 2 The Theological Origins of Engineering B R A D J . K A L L E N B E R G

P A R T 2 . B U I L D I N G T H E B R I D G E

Chapter 3 A Catholic and Marianist Engineering Education K E V I N H A L L I N A N A N D M A R G A R E T P I N N E L L

vii

xiii

xix

1

13

41

59

vi

Contents

Chapter 4 Engineering at Santa Clara: Jesuit Values in Silicon Valley D A N I E L A . P I T T

Chapter 5 A Systems View of Timedependent Ethical Decisions H A M I D A . R A F I Z A D E H A N D B R A D J . K A L L E N B E R G

Chapter 6 Pursuing Dialogue between Theologians and Engineers J A M E S C H A E F E R A N D PA U L C . H E I D E B R E C H T

P A R T 3 . I N T E R N A T I O N A L S E R V I C E L E A R N I N G

Chapter 7 Human Development and a Senior Project in Mali C A M I L L E M . G E O R G E A N D B A R B A R A K . S A I N

Chapter 8 International Service Learning at Marquette University DANIEL H. ZITOMER, LARS E. OLSON, AND JOHN P. BORG

90

104

118

143

169

PART 4. FORMATION AND PREPARATION OF STUDENTS

Chapter 9 Vocational Awareness in Engineering Students S C O T T J . S C H N E I D E R

Chapter 10 Helping Students Discern Engineering as a Vocation C A R M I N E P O L I T O , D O U G L A S T O U G A W , A N D K R A I G J . O L E J N I C Z A K

List of Contributors

Index

185

199

213

220

Foreword

D A V I D J . O ’ B R I E N

For three days in September 2005, I had the good fortune to partici pate in a conference on “The Role of Engineering at a Catholic Univer sity” at the University of Dayton. I am no engineer, but I am interested in Catholic higher education, and I found the proceedings extremely encouraging. My fellow participants, a majority of whom were engi neering professors, seemed to share the single basic conviction essential to the vitality of Catholic higher education: that the Catholic intellec tual tradition, and the Catholic Church, provides resources of mind and spirit that can enrich the teaching and learning that define the mission of the university and the vocation of its faculty and students. I have always believed that, and it was refreshing to take part in an exchange with first class scholars, Catholic and nonCatholic, who shared that conviction. In recent years a great deal of attention has been paid to the integ rity of American Catholic colleges and universities, over two hundred of them across the United States. Critics ask whether these institutions are “really Catholic” because they seem to offer programs and courses similar to those offered in other colleges and universities. Even warm friends sometimes worry that one institution or another has gained academic stature and fiscal stability but sacrificed its distinctive Catho lic identity. In response, Catholic academic leaders point to firstrate academic programs in theology, wellfunded pastoral ministries, and continuing commitment to a liberal arts core curriculum as evidence of Catholic identity. And in recent years more and more institutions have initiated faculty and staff development programs aimed at a wider

vii

viii

David J. O’Brien

understandingofCatholicacademicresponsibilities.TheMarianist University of Dayton has been a leader in this effort. In 1990, after a long, worldwide consultation, Pope John Paul II issued an Apostolic Constitution on Catholic higher education,Ex corde ecclesiae. The pope strongly reaffirmed the church’s commitment to scholarship and challenged Catholic institutions to assist the church by fostering dialogue between faith and culture.Ex corde ecclesiaealso called for closer relationships between academic institutions and the hierarchy, and between Catholic theologians and the church’s teaching authority. Tensions around those questions at times distracted atten tion from the overall commitment of the Catholic community, elo quently affirmed by the Holy See, to the work of Catholic scholarship and Catholic education. Translating that commitment into creative programs adapted to the ever changing landscapes of American society and American higher education is the task facing Catholic higher edu cation today, and the Dayton conference demonstrated that some insti tutions and their faculties are meeting that challenge in the world of engineering research and education. This conference was unique. To the best of my knowledge it was the first effort to bring together faculty and administrators who had been thinking about the relationship between Catholic commitment and engineering education. Of course many institutions, encouraged byEx corde ecclesiae,have developed eloquent mission statements, new programs of faculty and staff orientation and development, curricular initiatives, usually centered on the core curriculum, and centers to pro vide space for study and reflection on missionrelated questions. But all agree that the first priority is to convince the faculty that Catholic af filiation is a good thing, not just for the institution but for the practice of their vocation. Among the most daunting challenges is the specialization of con temporary academic life, with faculty formed in disciplinecentered graduate programs, conducting research on discipline specific, some times quite narrow issues. Faculty naturally think that they are not qualified to deal with questions of meaning and value, questions best left to the departments of philosophy, religious studies, or theology. Catholic and other churchrelated colleges and universities, altogether

Foreword ix

committed to serious scholarship, recognize the demands of disciplin ary and professional integrity but cannot settle for segmentation that would leave the big questions of power, purpose, and personal and historic possibility to the humanities at school and to the church later on. Instead they search in their own way for the integration that has long been the promise of liberal education and the goal of Christian education. In this setting the most impressive thing about the Dayton con ference was the leadership, enthusiasm, and participation of a signifi cant number of University of Dayton engineering faculty. Their com mitment to the project and to exploring creative efforts to integrate their program into the Catholic mission of their own university shaped the spirit of the conference. I have visited many Catholic schools for missionrelated programs, and I have rarely encountered faculty of a professional school so selfconfident in discussing Catholic issues re lated to their area of responsibility. Several professors, Catholic and nonCatholic, explained that the source of their confidence was a fac ulty seminar facilitated by thenProvost and later University Professor of Faith and Culture James Heft, S.M. I knew that Dayton had over many years invested heavily in faculty development programs, encour aging faculty to find resources for their work as scholars and teachers in the Catholic intellectual tradition. Released time from teaching, sti pends for summer seminars, research and writing, leadership from tal ented faculty, and support by administrators genuinely committed to supporting Catholic intellectual life on campus: all these have been provided at Dayton. One special seminar for engineers, well described in the proceedings, provided the backdrop for Dayton’s own curricular initiatives and for the conference I attended. So here was evidence that investment in faculty development, conducted with intelligence and trust, can have genuinely constructive outcomes. The conference demonstrated that Dayton is not alone. A number of other Catholic and Christian universities have taken steps to help engineering faculty confront missionrelated questions. Several are re ported in these papers. Almost all participants reported renewed appre ciation of the liberal arts core curriculum, experiments in interdisci plinary and crossdisciplinary programs, especially with theology, and