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The National Center for Engineering and Technology Education: Supporting Teacher Professional Development

Introduction

William Wulf [1], president of the National Academy of Engineering, noted in his summary remarks at the IEEE Engineering and Education Deans’ Summit Conference I, that encouraging engineers and educators to work together to address issues of technological literacy is a brilliant idea. The dialog between engineering educators and technology educators shows great potential for a symbiotic alliance to benefit both. The dialog has been facilitated by the publication of the Standards for Technological Literacy, [2] national content standards for technology education similar to, and aligned with, the national standards for mathematics education and for science education. The Standards for Technological Literacy (STL) were developed by the International Technology Education Association (ITEA) with funding from NSF and NASA. The STL were reviewed and endorsed by the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and William Wulf wrote the forward to the document [3].

Salinger described the breadth of standards for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education and concluded that standards should promote cross- curricular teaching and learning and that the standards should be geared toward higher levels of achievement. He is not specific regarding what to teach, however, he strongly emphasized the need for curriculum integration among STEM subject areas.

The collaboration between engineering and technology educators is an important initiative that has tremendous potential for benefiting both. Therefore, the National Center for Engineering and Technology Education (NCETE) has been established.

Goals and Purpose

The ultimate goal of NCETE is to build understanding of the learning and teaching problems encountered by high school students and teachers as they apply engineering design processes to technological problems. The engineering design process plays a central role in bringing about improvements in products and processes. Technology is central to the realization of processes and products. Both engineering design and technology are critical to the improvement of the quality of life. Taken together, engineering and technology are critical components of general education for all students as well as an orientation to a wide range of career opportunities.

The joining of engineering and technology education is being accomplished by teaming engineering faculty and technology educators to build capacity and infrastructure including collaborative technology teacher pre-service and professional development, funding for doctoral studies, and research.

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Becker, K. (2007, June), The National Center For Engineering And Technology Education: Supporting Teacher Professional Development Paper presented at 2007 Annual Conference & Exposition, Honolulu, Hawaii. 10.18260/1-2--2405