Hydraulic Engineering, a junior/senior-level course, is typically taught in a lecture-based format. Lecturing as a singular teaching technique has repeatedly been shown to be ineffective. Lecturing does not advance problem-solving skills, does not require creative or critical thinking, and does not prepare students for the types of problems they will face as professional engineers. In this study, two teaching techniques, problem-based learning (PBL) and cooperative learning (CL), were used to enhance learning in the hydraulic engineering course. The goals of PBL are to provide the student with an active role in learning and to allow the student to take responsibility for learning. The goals of CL are to have students work in teams, thereby learning from both each other and the instructor, and to teach students to work together cooperatively in small groups. Methods of developing teams, projects, and other assignments were explored. The course was assessed midterm and at the end of the semester. As a result, some changes were made midsemester and other recommendations are made for the future.

Engineering appears to be at a turning point. It is evolving from an occupation that provides employers and clients with competent technical advice to a profession that serves the community in a socially responsible manner. Traditional engineering education caters to the former ideal, whereas increasingly both engineers themselves and their professional societies aspire to the latter. Employers are also requiring more from their engineering employees than technical proficiency. A new educational approach is needed to meet these changing requirements. It is no longer sufficient, nor even practical, to attempt to cram students full of technical knowledge in the hope that it will enable them to do whatever engineering task is required of them throughout their careers. A broader, more general approach is required that not only helps students to understand basic engineering principles but also gives them the ability to acquire more specialized knowledge as the need arises.

This paper describes an undergraduate, upper-division, multicultural core course at the University of Colorado at Denver entitled “Science, Technology, and Culture” and its companion electronic archive, “STC-Link.” STC-Link, an Internet web site, contains a syllabus with class assignments, e-mail, chat capability, and student generated materials from several case histories: “The Animas La Plata Project”; “Hohokam Irrigation”; “The San Luis Valley Aquifiers”; “Inka Fountains and Water Works”; and “Culture and the Internet.” The case histories are stored as HTML files and are retrievable through technology to illustrate interrelationships in science, technology, and culture, emphasizing issues related to race, gender, and the individual. A full third of the class is devoted to a design project, where students are web page developers, making them active participants in authoring STC-Link for future students and researchers. As a teaching aid in the classroom and at distance, STC-Link encourages cooperative learning and facilitates a more open and experiential understanding of technology and culture. Through rapid retrieval of images, maps, graphs, formatted text, and remote web sites relevant to the topic at hand, students and the instructor realize a new teaching paradigm. The paper concludes with three observations. First, so far, the best use of STC-Link as a teaching tool is in the design aspect of the course, because of the participatory nature of this use of the archive. Second, the success of STC-Link as an electronic stand-alone archive leads the writers to anticipate further development of the archive as an Intranet and on-line distance education course. Third, after three years of using STC-Link in the classroom, the writers are convinced that new teaching technologies, especially the Internet and the Web, will radically change the nature of classroom and extra-classroom instruction. These changes are itemized in the conclusion. The web site address is: http://www.cudenver.edu/stc-link.

Over the past 20 years many Malaysian students have chosen to leave their country and come to the United States for an engineering education. Reasons for this include: (1) insufficient local universities, (2) the need for state-of-the-art knowledge, and (3) a rising standard of living that makes a U.S. education more affordable. This paper discusses how the opportunity for an American engineering education is made available to students in Malaysia. A historical perspective is provided; then, three models—twinning, articulation, and credit transfer—are introduced, along with a discussion of the pros and cons of each. A case study of a twinning program between a U.S. consortium—comprised of the University of Kentucky, the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, and Oklahoma State University—and Metropolitan College of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia is presented.