Answering the question of how to create the new economy engineer is extremely complex and requires looking into the past and understanding our history. Engineers have created some of the most wondrous marvels on this earth, including the atomic bomb, Hoover Dam, and CERN’s Large Hadron Collider. However, the pure technical thinking of engineers past no longer suffices. I have begun my search for answers by examining David Goldberg’s book, The Entrepreneurial Engineer.
In his book, Goldberg believes there are ten competencies the entrepreneurial engineer must search for and understand. I will focus on just one: “seek the joy of engineering”. This chapter does a great job of exploring the philosophical and historical foundations of engineering. The Cold War, for example, created an engineer with rigid ideals and purely technical abilities. However, engineers are still struggling to emerge from this mold.
History, it seems, can be a dependable resource for understanding the evolution of the profession and its education. What other major events have shaped the engineering curriculum and profession? What revolutions have been missed? And how can this history help colleges and universities prepare for the future?
