Engineering the Future: Does Civil Engineering Have the Courage to Change?

About a year ago, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) executive committee established the task committee on “Transforming our Workforce.” It was to be a “blue-sky” exercise, first to use a blank sheet of paper to design how we would approach outreach, multiple pathways toward becoming a civil engineer, what the undergraduate curriculum should look like and how we would tackle licensure. After we had a vision, the committee was to plot the course to achieve the vision.

It has been a monumental task, but here we are a year later, and the ASCE board is considering the report in mid-July. I’m hopeful that when you read this, we will have an approved framework for moving forward.

Find the Theme

When I asked the committee early on to come up with our theme song, I heard many suggestions. When I was working on both the replacement of the Tappan Zee Bridge in New York City and the upgrades to the Peace Bridge in Buffalo, N.Y., we all had theme songs for the projects in our portfolio. Mine was Warren Zevon, “Lawyers, Guns and Money.” The committee chose “The Courage to Change,” by Sia, based on District Member Pat Natale’s recommendation. Go listen to it on YouTube—the anthem is so appropriate.

During the last 30 years, there have been many convenings, summits and committees with reports written on the need to modernize the civil engineering curriculum, open our doors to a vast group of qualified individuals and weave students into our profession as opposed to weeding them out.

In 2008, Dr. Patricia Galloway, ASCE’s first female president, published a book, The 21st Century Engineer, which outlined what needed to be done to address this issue almost 20 years ago. In the book’s forward, Dr. G. Wayne Clough, PH.D., P.E., president of the Georgia Institute of Technology, stated, “Change is a constant in society, and engineering helps to drive change and is driven by it.” I’m ashamed to admit that, as a profession, I don’t believe we’re driving the change.

Galloway stated that leadership had four central components:

1. The desire to win

2. A focus on results

3. The ability to adapt to change

4. The ability to create an environment of trust

To master leadership skills, she stated we must focus on communication, confidence and commitment.

There have been many books published in this area, and the latest is The Inclusive Engineering Mindset by the American Association of Engineering Educators. The findings and recommendations in the Mindset report are centered around the following six main themes:

1. Create flexible program structures to remove barriers

2. Evidence-based pedagogy: Creating a student-centered engineering education

3. An accessible and diverse engineering education learning environment

4. Preparing campuses for a student-centered engineering education

5. Leveraging strategic partnerships

6. Engineering a new mindset for engineering education

Do More

There’s a lot of talk on the current and coming workforce crisis, and we’re in an existential crisis in the civil engineering and infrastructure space. I hope we’ll stop acting as “think tanks” and step it up to be “do tanks.”

My beloved profession deserves so much more innovation in process and tools, related to the original pipeline of engineers and allied professionals as well as the retainage of those individuals throughout a robust career, so our pipeline doesn’t leak.

I’m proud to have been the conductor of a group of highly skilled and passionate engineers who met hours every week for more than a year to deliver this workforce report that’s a vision for the future. The report includes various short-, mid- and long-term actions, including deadlines.

As far as undergraduate curriculum is concerned, I believe there’s way too much focus on theory and research and not enough on the application and practice. While 10 to 15 percent of undergraduates will continue their education to become professors or researchers, the remainder will serve in private and public practice. What industry in the modern world caters to 10 to 15 percent of their customer base and survives? With the demographic cliff we’re facing and the tremendous pressure on universities from geo-political change, I anticipate those institutions who don’t alter their programs to cater to the majority of their industry will not survive.

Dr. “Pat” Galloway, I’m sorry you didn’t live long enough to see your vision come true. I’m proud to have delivered this blueprint for the future as a tribute to your leadership and mentorship. This one is for you!