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Exploratory Investigation of Personal Influences on Educators’ Engagement in Engineering Ethics and Societal Impacts Instruction

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Abstract

Cultivating an understanding of ethical responsibilities and the societal impacts of technology is increasingly recognized as an important component in undergraduate engineering curricula. There is growing research on how ethics-related topics are taught and outcomes are attained, especially in the context of accreditation criteria. However, there is a lack of theoretical and empirical understanding of the role that educators play in ethics and societal impacts (ESI) instruction and the factors that motivate and shape their inclusion of this subject in the courses they teach and co-curricular activities they mentor. The goal of this research was to explore the role of faculty’s personal influences on their inclusion of ESI instruction in these settings. Personal influences are distinguished from external or environmental drivers such as teaching assignments, university policies, and department curriculum decisions. This research employed a grounded theory methodology and extracted data from interviews with 19 educators who teach ESI to engineering students to develop an emergent conceptualization of personal influences. Four categorie were identified: intrapersonal (drawing on self-interests and beliefs), interpersonal (drawing on relationships to engage in the intersectional field of ESI), academic (using their experiences as a student), and professional (leveraging non-academic work to understand the application of ESI and bring ESI into the classroom). The findings suggested a wide range of entry points (based on varying interests, beliefs, interactions, and backgrounds) into ESI instruction for faculty members who do not currently teach ESI and for those looking to expand the inclusion of ESI in their courses. Based on these findings, departments and administrators are encouraged to foster educators’ agency, support access to professional development and engagement, facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration, and broaden hiring decisions to account for the impact of educators’ holistic identity on their instruction.

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Acknowledgements

This material is based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant #1540348, #1540341, #1540308, and #1755390. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Civil and Coastal Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

    Madeline Polmear

  2. Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA

    Angela R. Bielefeldt

  3. Mechanical Engineering, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA

    Daniel Knight

  4. Civil and Environmental Engineering, Tufts University, Medford, MA, USA

    Chris Swan

  5. CYS Structural Engineers, Sacramento, CA, USA

    Nathan Canney

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  1. Madeline Polmear
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Correspondence to Madeline Polmear.

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Polmear, M., Bielefeldt, A.R., Knight, D. et al. Exploratory Investigation of Personal Influences on Educators’ Engagement in Engineering Ethics and Societal Impacts Instruction. Sci Eng Ethics 26, 3143–3165 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-020-00261-x

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