I’m in Pittsburgh today attending the American Society of Engineering Educators annual conference. The opening plenary speech was delivered by Charles Vest, the President of the National Academy of Engineering. Before tackling that job, he was the President of MIT from 1990 – 2004. Clearly, this guy knows his engineering!
One of the things that’s been missing from engineering education is inspiration. Without it, too many students bypass an engineering career altogether. Proof of the general lack of interest has been showing up in declining enrolment over the past decade. This sounds like a marketing problem! After all, it’s hard to see how students could fail to be inspired by the biggest challenges facing humankind and our planet. The National Academy of Engineering has taken an excellent step to help people understand the important role that engineers will play in solving the world’s biggest problems.
The National Academy of Engineering recruited some great engineering thinkers to generate a list of the Grand Engineering Challenges that should inspire a generation of engineers. Here’s the list:
- Make solar energy economical
- Provide energy from fusion
- Develop carbon sequestration methods
- Manage the nitrogen cycle
- Provide access to clean water
- Restore and improve urban infrastructure
- Advance health informatics
- Engineer better medicines
- Reverse-engineer the brain
- Prevent nuclear terror
- Secure cyberspace
- Enhance virtual reality
- Advance personalized learning
- Engineer the tools of scientific discovery
I encourage you to visit http://www.engineeringchallenges.org/ and watch the video to learn more. You can also add your voice to the discussion.
Thx
John
jhayes@engineering.com