KOLMOS, Anette

Professor in Engineering Education and PBL,
Director for the UNESCO Aalborg Centre for Problem Based Learning in Engineering Science and Sustainability (Denmark)

Anette Kolmos is Professor in Engineering Education and PBL, Director for the UNESCO category 2 Centre: Aalborg Centre for Problem Based Learning in Engineering Science and Sustainability. Chair holder for UNESCO in Problem Based Learning in Engineering Education, Aalborg University, Denmark. Guest professor at KTH Royal Institute of Technology and Guest Professor at UTM University Technology Malaysia 2011-2013. President of SEFI 2009–2011 (European Society for Engineering Education). Founding Chair of the SEFI-working group on Engineering Education Research. Was awarded the IFEES Global Award for Excellence in Engineering Education, 2013. During the last 20 years, Dr. Kolmos has researched the following areas, primarily within Engineering Education: gender and technology, project based and problem based curriculum (PBL), change from traditional to project organized and problem based curriculum, development of transferable skills in PBL and project work, and methods for staff development. She is Associate Editor for the European Journal of Engineering Education and was Associated Editor for Journal of Engineering Education (ASEE). Involved in supervision of 13 PhD projects and published around 200 publications. Member of several organizations and committees within EER, national government bodies, and committees in the EU.

 

ABSTRACT

09:30-11:00 6 NOVEMBER
PLENARY SESSION IV. Science in the innovation ecosystem

Educating for sustainable development – a systemic curriculum change?

There is a call for new engineering and science competencies corresponding the grand challenges – and that institutions change their curricula to include sustainability. However, educational change is a complicated process and the ways engineering institutions have responded form a pattern with three very different curriculum strategies: an add-on strategy, an integration strategy or a re-building strategy. The add-on strategy covers activities such as establishing new curriculum activities parallel to the existing, whereas the integration strategy represent the effort to integrate into the existing structure. The add-on strategy and integration strategy are the ones most commonly used, whereas the re-building strategy is at an emerging stage in most engineering education communities. The re-building strategy represent a systemic approach reflecting and changing teaching and learning modes together with interdisciplinary approaches. Most engineering schools find it very challenging to re-build an entire curriculum, so smaller changes are generally preferred such as adding on new courses or integrating small elements into existing courses. This short presentation will present a conceptualisation of these three very different response strategies. All three strategies are based on management decisions as well as academic faculty decisions; however the implications for using the various strategies are very different in terms of system change, role of disciplines, leader interventions and faculty development strategies.