SEFI Ethics Special Interest Group Newsletter

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February 2022

SEFI Ethics Special Interest Group Newsletter

Coming up in this month’s newsletter

Dear reader,

In our previous last online seminar of 2021 we focused on presenting globalised perspectives for engineering ethics education, through examples and insights put forward by Glen Miller (Texas A&M University, USA), Alexandra Kazakova (Gubkin Russian State University, Russia), Satya Sundar Sethy (Indian Institute of Technology Madras, India) and Qin Zhu, (Colorado School of Mines, USA). Our first newsletter of 2022 complements these perspectives, by presenting additional contextualised examples and measures for supporting a culturally broad approach to engineering ethics education. As this is the first newsletter of the year, we wish you an insightful 2022 and we hope we can continue together on this path of dialogue and borderless collaborations.

Global Perspectives in Engineering Ethics Education

Although engineering has always been an international endeavor and the worldwide focus has been core in engineering, integrating global perspectives in engineering ethics education is far from obvious.

Esther Matemba states in Redefining the “dominated” power position in global engineering and in globalization studies in engineering education that the existing structure of global engineering education facilitates the reproduction of inequalities and injustices in Sub-Saharan Africa. She argues that “globalisation studies and activities push for reforms in engineering education towards outcome-based education, competence-based accreditation, and student-centred pedagogy. When the same push is experienced in Africa without taking into account the very constraints the systems face results in initiatives which fail to make significant impact.”

The answer is far from evident and one humble newsletter cannot solve that problem. However, we can mention a (non-exhaustive) list of aspects that can contribute to tackling the issues at hand.

One. Alessio Gerola pleas for More Intercultural Ethics of Technology.

He describes how a recent conference on this theme could be seen as a way to further contributed to a broader canon necessary for global perspectives.

Two. The impact of intercultural ethics of technology on students should be guiding in developing engineering ethics education.

Balamuralithara Balakrishnan in Broadening Western engineering ethics with religious and cultural values from different parts of the World describes his recent study indicating that Malaysian engineering undergraduates make ethical decisions in accordance with their cultural and religious values. Individuals with varying cultural and religious backgrounds make ethical judgments and approach ethical issues in unique ways. The right elaboration of global perspectives in engineering ethics education should scaffold this instead of hampering it.

Three. Global perspectives require a systemic organisation.

Satya Sundar Sethy discusses in Engineering Ethics Education: An Indian Perspective an Indian systemic example including the admission criteria sytem, particular courses with particular methods and ethics, the need for an engineering council at the national level, and so forth.

Four. Educational methods should be aligned with the global perspectives.

Malebogo Ngoepe, Corrinne Shaw, Kate le Roux and Brandon Collier-Reed describe in Ethics in Engineering Education. Case study of mining in South Africa a first-year level introduction to mechanical engineering course. A case study has been developed in which silicosis and tuberculosis among miners employed in South Africa’s gold mining industry is studies. This case, and the mining itself, refers to global aspect by referring to South Africa’s socio-political and economic history and reflects the varying degrees of personhood granted to different individuals, at different times.

A second example is given by Kirsten A. Davis, Siddhant S. Joshi, Lori Czerwionka, Gabriel Rios Rojas, Francisco J. Montalvo in their contribution Developing students' understanding of context through a humanities-informed engineering course. They describe a course which objective is to prepare engineering students to apply their technical skills appropriately and successfully in a wide range of global contexts and communities. To develop these skills, students analyze engineering case studies in different global locations from a humanistic–engineering perspective. Analysis of the student learning revealed that students developed a deeper understanding of the information needed about the context of a problem to develop an effective solution.

Five. Engineering ethics research itself should reflect global perspectives and equal participation.

Rana Tallal Javed and Junaid Qadir in their Ethics in Engineering Education and Practice: Assessing the State of the Art report on research that shows engineering ethics research as a mainly US oriented endeavor and aim for a more global involvement.

Thank you for starting the year with us, from any part of the world you are joining us!

Gunter Bombaerts and Diana Martin

Invitation: SEFI SIG Ethics online seminar series

SEFI Ethics Alpine/Hybrid Retreat 2022

31st March - 1st April 2022 (Leysin, Switzerland) - Engineering ethics education and social justice: synthesis and growth

31st March - 1st April 2022

Registrations will open soon for the SEFI Ethics SIG Spring School 2022. Participants will pay only their accommodation costs – there is no registration fee for the Spring School itself. Some sessions will also be available in hybrid format online. https://www.sefi.be/2022/01/25/sefi-engineering-ethics-sig-spring-school-2022-engineering-ethics-education-and-social-justice-synthesis-and-growth/

Spring School themes will include:

Using emotions in engineering education to bridge the divide between micro and macro ethics
Research methods to examine the ethical culture of a university
Using digital games for the teaching and learning of ethics in STEM
An asset-based approach to reframing engineering ethics education
Masculinities and ethics in engineering education

Location: The Spring School will take place in the Swiss village of Leysin. Secluded in the Alps, Leysin will provide a quiet space apart from daily life to allow participants to engage with the spring school’s themes and to collaborate with each other. Leysin is accessible by train from Geneva main railway station and airport. Leysin is also a renowned ski resort, and participants will be able to avail of the winter sports facilities for skiing and snowshoeing, fatbiking, and tobogganing…

For more information, please contact the organizer Roland at [email protected]

Register here

9 February 2022 - Empowering and engaging engineering students

Wednesday 9 February, 3-5 pm CET / 9-11am EST

Speakers:

Homero Murzi (Virginia Tech, USA): Culturally Relevant Pedagogy - Amplifying Students' Voices in the Classroom

Siara Isaac (EPFL, Switzerland): Practical strategies for increasing equity in project teams: skills for students

Nathan Amanquah (Asheshi University, Ghana): tbc

Karolina Doulougeri (TU Eindhoven, Netherlands): Empowering engineering students to become self-regulated learners

Inclusive learning environments and equity-centred classrooms contribute to the development of students who are empowered and engaged. In turn, empowered students are better prepared and motivated to question the practices in their surrounding environment, in order to grow as professionals and improve society. Our speakers present several examples and strategies for cultivating student empowerment and engagement in the engineering classroom.

Interested to speak at one of our next seminars or propose a theme for discussion? Feel welcome to contact the seminar series’ organizer Diana ([email protected]).

Register here

If you wish to propose a theme for a future ethics seminar, or are interested in organizing such a seminar yourself, please contact Diana ([email protected]).

News and initiatives

The SEFI Ethics SIG online seminar series: The schedule for our next seminars for the spring and summer of 2022 are available for registration, at the following link. We have an exciting list of speakers joining us to discuss their work on topics such as:

9 February, 3-5 pm CET / 9-11am EST: student empowerment and engagement (Homero Murzi, Virginia Tech, USA; Siara Isaac EPFL, Switzerland; Nathan Amanquah; Asheshi University, Ghana; Karolina Doulougeri, TU Eindhoven, The Netherlands)
28 March, 3-5pm CET / 9-11 am EST: Teaching societal responsibility through real life projects and challenge-based learning (Emanuela Tilley, UCL, UK; Jorge Membrillo-Hernández Monterey Tec, Mexico; Kyriaki Papageorgiou, ESADE, Spain; Christian Herzog, University of Luebeck.
19 April, 11-13 EST / 17-19 CET: Engineers for social change (Susan Lord, University of San Diego, USA; Johanna Höffken; TU Eindhoven, The Netherlands; Darshan Karwat, Arizona State University, USA; Eddie Conlon, TU Dublin, Ireland)
17 May, 3pm – 5pm/ 9-11am EST: Workshop Responsible Research and Innovation in Engineering Education (Tom Børsen, Aalborg University, Denmark; Kate Roach, UCL, UK)
22 June, 3pm – 5pm/ 9-11am EST: Engineering Education Leaders' Vision on the Role and Prospects of Ethics (Donna Riley, Purdue University, USA; John Mitchell, UCL, UK; Juan Lucena, Colorado School of Mines, USA; Isabelle Reymens, TU Eindhoven, The Netherlands)

SEFI Contributions welcome: If you want to contribute an editorial based on any of the seminar themes, or wish to propose a future seminar theme and to nominate yourself as a speaker, please reach out to Diana ([email protected])

Innovative Engineering Curriculum workshop series: “Bringing Life to our Engineering Curricula” is a recent collaboration between a number of academic institutions in South Africa and the United Kingdom. This initiative specifically focuses on showcasing curriculum strategies that exist across South African Higher Education Institutions. The project will offer workshops and activities for all engineering institutions. In these sessions, innovative integrated curriculum frameworks will be explored and developed. More information is available on the project website.

Handbook with a global outlook: Ethics in Engineering is now at the 5th edition, co-authored by Qin Zhu, Mike Martin and Roland Schinzinger. This edition is the first text to systemically discuss the global dimension of engineering ethics and includes tools for training students global ethical competency. It continues the text's strong emphasis on the role of technology and design in shaping ethical decision-making in engineering. More information on the publisher website.

Open calls - Upcoming events

SEFI SiG Ethics: Empowering and engaging engineering students

Wednesday 9 February, 3-5 pm CET / 9-11am EST – Registration

SEFI SiG Alpine retreat: Engineering ethics education and social justice: synthesis and growth

Dates: 31st March - 1st April 2022 – Info

Expressions of interest and session proposals welcome until 16 Jan 2022 at [email protected]

SEFI SiG Ethics: Engineers for social change

Tuesday 19 April 11-13 EST / 17-19 CET – Registration

The Boston University Graduate Student Philosophy Conference: Sustainability and Environmental Ethics

21-22 April 2022, Boston, USA

Call for papers (dl 18 December 2021)

SEFI SiG Ethics: Teaching societal responsibility through real life projects and challenge-based learning

Monday 28 March, 3-5pm CET / 8-10 am Mexico / 9-11 am EST – Registration

SEFI SiG Ethics: Responsible Research and Innovation in Engineering Education

17 May, 8-10am EST / 2-4pm CET – Registration

SEFI SiG Ethics: Engineering Education Leaders' Vision on the Role and Prospects of Ethics.

Wednesday 22 June, 9-11 am EST/ 3-5pm CET – Registration

The 22nd ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition

26-29 June 2022, Minneapolis, USA - Call for abstracts (dl 8 February 2022)

Recent articles and publications

Recent publications and articles dedicated to engineering ethics education are now available on our website.

The Ethics SIG Newsletter is issued 10 times per year and aims to share information on latest engineering ethics research and practices. If you would like to join the mailing list please use the form on the SEFI Ethics SIG website.

If you have something you want to share in the newsletter (great ideas, upcoming workshops, nice experiences …), let us know: Diana ([email protected]) and Gunter ([email protected]) Or connect with us on Twitter using #SefiEthics to signal publications, initiatives or events for inclusion in the newsletter

SEFI thanks its corporate partners for their support:

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www.sefi.be

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