Education Today for Environmental Challenges Tomorrow

The education of engineering students today for the environmental challenges of tomorrow demands an interdisciplinary approach to problem solving and design. Students must obtain a firm foundation in science, mathematics, engineering sciences and the liberal arts which will permit them to be versatile and to grow in the future. In addition, students must be challenged by real-world, poorly defined problems involving social and economic values as well as science and technology. This paper analyzes the professional engineering program at Dartmouth College in relation to the aforementioned objectives, and emphasizes the need for open-ended projects, both group and individual, undergraduate and graduate, to prepare students for environmental problems of the future. Specific projects, sponsored by industry and others, are noted including undergraduate group projects focused on human or environmental needs and individual graduate design projects developed in the context of industrial internship.