Sustainable, Global, Interdisciplinary, and Concerned for Others? Trends in Environmental Engineering Students

Abstract

In this study the four affective attributes of sustainability value, global interest, interdisciplinary value, and concern for others were explored among engineering students.The research questions were: (1) to what extent are incoming environmental engineering students motivated by sustainable engineering, interested in global work, value interdisciplinary skills, and recognize the importance of consideration for others in the context of engineering; ( 2) to what extent are environmental engineering students similar to or different from civil and architectural engineering students in these attitudes; and (3) are there correlations between these attitudes.To answer these research questions, a survey consisting of 7-point Likert items was given to students at the beginning of the semester in courses designed to introduce first year students to environmental, civil, and/or architectural engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder.Twenty-five survey items were used to measure four sub-components of sustainable engineering motivation, single items were used to measure global interests and interdisciplinary value, and nine items evaluated consideration for others.Sustainable engineering self-efficacy, value, and negative attitudes were similar among students in all three majors.Environmental engineering students had higher scores than civil and architectural engineering majors in sustainable engineering affect and overall motivation.Interest in working on projects outside the U.S. was high, without significant differences between environmental, civil, and architectural engineering students.Interdisciplinary value was the higher among environmental and civil engineering students than architectural engineering students at the start of the semester.Architectural engineering students increased their value for interdisciplinary contexts during the semester.Concern for others was the highest among environmental and civil engineering students, and lower among architectural engineering students.There were weak positive correlations between these attitudes that were statistically significant, with differences between disciplines.For example, correlations between sustainable engineering value and concern for others was moderately positive among environmental engineering students (0.60 correlation coefficient), and lower for civil and architectural engineering students (0.44 and 0.49, respectively).Comparing responses to the survey at the end of the semester, environmental engineering students increased their sustainable engineering self-efficacy but decreased in sustainable engineering value and concern for others.On the post survey, sustainable engineering value and concern for others were positively correlated with intent to graduate in engineering for environmental engineering students.Therefore, it appears that emphasizing elements of sustainable engineering, global opportunities, and how engineering can benefit others may be synergistic and also yield benefits for encouraging students to stay in engineering.

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