Attracting High Potential Students taking Environmental Engineering as an Example
Educating chemical engineers for coming challenges
Chemical Engineering Education -Poster Session (T6-P)
Keywords: Environmental Engineering, Engineering Education, Increasing Application Numbers
A general and major problem for many if not all engineering degree courses is attracting those students, with the highest potential for a successful study. Engineering is perceived as difficult and complicated. Despite the fact that – at least at the moment – industry is seeking engineers from a broad spectrum of disciplines, numbers of applications and enrolled students are decreasing. This is a problem that has to be addressed adequately in order to not only fully use university’s capacities but also to meet industry’s current and future requirements concerning qualified human resources. Taking the situation in Germany as an example, the number of high-school graduates (legitimate for enrolling at universities or polytechnics) is increasing since the late 1970’s. The percentage of these young graduates actually enrolling at a university is fluctuating between 60 % in 1985 and 92 % in 1990/ 91 (just after reunification of East and West Germany). In 2004 a fraction of 19 % enrolled in engineering sciences. In view of the high contribution of engineers to the value chain, this percentage is relatively low. Additionally, the number of engineering students prematurely terminating their studies is quite high (up to 50 %, depending on discipline).
The international B.Sc. course on Environmental Engineering at the University of Applied Sciences Bremen has to deal with these problems as many other engineering courses as well. In 2005, these problems were addressed by initiating a program aiming at increasing study quality and application numbers as well as at decreasing study abortions. To reach this aim, the program includes various counter measures of which a selection is being described below.
Every year, students of the fourth semester organise an excursion for students of the second semester. During this three-day field trip, students visit various companies that are either working in the field of environmental engineering or that have particular facilities relevant from an environmental point of view. By conducting the excursion at such an early stage (first year of studies) students become acquainted with their future working environments and typical tasks of engineers. Another example for teaching complex engineering skills at a very early stage is the “Environmental Engineering Project” (EEP). Here, teams of students of the third and fourth semester work on realistic engineering tasks, often in co-operation with industry. Examples for projects carried out so far are the conceptual design of a pilot-scale adsorption column or the optimisation of energy consumption of an agricultural enterprise. Although the required abilities for successfully managing these tasks are very demanding for second year students, the EEP is generally perceived very positively resulting in increased study motivation.
During the project it became obvious that many students lacked knowledge about study contents and about the working field of engineers. In order to rectify this lack of knowledge, various measures were implemented. These include an improved internet presence (since our experience shows that the internet is the most preferred source of information for applicants), several information events and various training courses prior to the first semester. Another extensive project aims at transferring scientific and engineering methods to high-school students. In this context, a variety of experiments is being prepared, tested and documented. Teachers will be provided with detailed instructions of these experiments and they will have the possibility of borrowing the required equipment.
By applying these and other measures in the international B.Sc. course on Environmental Engineering, the percentage of students terminating their studies prematurely, could be lowered to under 30 %, with most current retention rates of up to 90 %. Furthermore, an increase in application numbers could be observed.
Presented Monday 17, 13:30 to 15:00, in session Chemical Engineering Education -Poster Session (T6-P).
