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ContentsTHE MODERNIZATION PROGRAM IN ENGINEERING EDUCATION AT THE FEDERAL UNIVERSITY OF MINAS GERAIS STATE
This paper presents the main goals of the Modernization Program in Engineering Education of the Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil, that began at the end of 1994. The Program was aimed at preparing the students to work in a more competitive and global market in order to help the country to promote sustainable development. In the sense of to design a new engineering profile the Program has proposed changes in the curricula structure, in the contents and, mainly, in the pedagogic methods of teaching.
The Engineering School at the Federal University of Minas Gerais State (UFMG), in Brazil, founded in1901, has 2500 undergraduate students in six engineering courses that offer the degree of bachelor. The courses are: Civil Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Metallurgical Engineering, Mining Engineering and Chemical Engineering. The Engineering School at the UFMG also offers graduated courses at the levels of M.Sc and Ph.D. in all six areas mentioned above. Thirteen Departments are responsible for the graduate and undergraduate courses.
At the end of 1994 the Engineering School of the Federal University of Minas Gerais State started its Modernization Program in Engineering Education.
The principal aim of the Program was to forge a new engineering profile, able to attend the expectations of a new economic, social and political era in Brazil. This new scenario was strongly marked by the globalization of the economy, which has been responsible for the increase in the competetive level of Brazil's industries and quality of life.
A year after the UFMG's Program was implemented important government agencies (FINEP, CAPES, CNPq and the Ministry of Education itself) started a national program called REENGE - Reengineering of Engineering Education (1). All Engineering Schools in the country were invited to present their education projects.
The Engineering School at the UFMG had no difficulty in having its project approved, since the Modernization Program installed a year before was in perfect agreement with the national program.
ASPECTS OF THE MODERNIZATION PROGRAM
How the Program was constituted
In Brazil, the last 20 years have been dedicated to developing the post-graduate courses. In spite of the importance of the above, 20 years with little improvement in undergraduate courses has been sufficient to cause deterioration
With respect to the decline in undergraduate courses the directory at the Engineering School decided to install a Program for Engineering Education Modernization. The Program had as its main principles the following (2):
To attend the above it was decided to start the activities of the program with a series of seminars about engineering education. These seminars, which numbered 26, in all, pointed out the evolution of engineering education in the first world and in Brazil as well as its future tendencies.
The objective of this first step was to involve the community, principally the faculties, around engineering education issues. It was observed that in the engineering schools professors were good at research, but usually they lacked the necessary teaching know how. Usually, the result was technical and scientific contents being transmitted to the student without an adequate relationship between teaching and learning.
During the seminars important decisions were agreed upon by the professors about the kind of engineer that the school would like to have graduate, and the best arrangement for the curricula.
Redefining the engineer profile
The agreement between the professors from the Engineering School at the UFMG is that the engineer needs to be able to (2):
develop and to work in new technologies;
recognize the social and environmental roles of the engineering activities;
solve problems;
communicate in more them one language, one of them being English;
have statistic and computer skills;
be creative;
develop a lidder spirit and to work as part of a time.
Having defined this profile the following step was to identify the necessaries changes in the curricula with respect to the structure, content and the pedagogic methods of teaching.
The curricula structure changes
The first agreement with respect to the curricula structure was to decrease the number of hours of the engineering courses.
In Brazil, the majority of the engineering curricula have around 4000 hours, distributed over a 5 years period. This means, approximately, 30 hours of theoretical and laboratory classes (mainly the theoretical), per week
With such large class demand, it is not possible for students to develop independent study. As a result the professors become the main, or only, source of knowledge for the student, who does not have the necessary time to research or take advantage of other available sources of knowledge i.e literature.
The decrease in curricula hours will change the professor and student roles. The professors will become the tutors of the students, helping them to look for information, professors themselves will be forced to be in a constant process of learning. On the other hand, the students will take part, actively, in their own learning process, looking for information out side class and in turn become more prepared for continuous education.
Furthermore, the decrease in the number of class hours will permit students to participate in the hands-on program (more time to work in the laboratories and to do work experience in industry).
The number of hours for the curricula established by the Modernization Program was 3600 hours, the minimum permitted by Brazilian regulation (3). This regulation was created in 1976 by the Ministry of Education and has been unchanged for the past 20 years. In spite of some of its concepts being modernized, it is not possible to consider this regulation as up to date after 20 years of intense change throughout the world.
When the Program started, in 1994, the Engineering School at the UFMG had 2 courses with 3600 hours (Electrical and Metallurgical Engineering) and the other 4 courses (Civil, Mechanical, Mining and Chemical Engineering) with 4100 hours, on average. Coincidentally, the two courses with a maximum of 3600 hours were considered to be the best.
To implement the proposal all the courses should be evaluated in the sense of cutting out technical content that is too specific and can be dispensed with quickly. It will also be necessary to cut out subjects that are taught more than once. Data has been shown that the same subject was presented more than once during the course. When questioned about this procedure, the professors, usually, say that the subject was not very well taught before or that the students did not have the capacity to learn the subject the first time round.
The main resistance to the proposal came from part time professors who did not participate in the Program's preliminary discussion. Usually, professors tend to think that they need time to transmit to the student all the necessary knowledge within their areas, as their classes are the only opportunity for the student to learn about that specific subject. As this reaction was expected, the Program made available to all professors a new course in methodology of teaching.
Another important change agreed upon was the redistribution of basic science, engineering science and technological courses during the 5 years of study.
The first two years of the present curricula are compiled of basic science (mathematics, physics and chemistry), computer science and statistic courses, all of them offered by the Institute of Basic Science at the UFMG. Only in the third year the student has engineering science and technical disciplines.
The arrangement of the first two years of the curricula gives rise to a lack of motivation on the part of engineering students. Data from the UFMG has shown that a significant number of engineering students give up within in the first two years (4). Depending on the engineering course, the number of students that give up could reach 50%, 90% of which do not enroll in their second year.
The change in the curricula proposed by the professors to solve this situation was to insert some of the engineering science and technical disciplines in the first two years. This new course structure is expected to contribute to the appropriate relationship between basic science and engineering problems.
The last change agreed upon was to make the curricula more flexible. At present, the curricula structures are a package of knowledge that the student receives and needs to absorb, without taking in account his individual difference of choice. Besides this, a very rigid curricula does not permit the necessary change to accompany the evolution of science and technology.
The proposal to make the curricula more flexible was to increase the number of elective courses, not only in technical areas but also in other areas such as humanity and social science.
The contents changes
The proposal to decrease the curricula's hours in all engineering courses will make it necessary to evaluate the contents of the disciplines and/or courses. As commented on before it will be necessary to cut out some subjects,which are too specific Depending on the course would it may be necessary to cut it out from the curricula, all together. Each engineering course council will analyze and decide the best course of action for the Modernization Program.
Having reduced course hours, there was another proposal to add new subjects or to strengthen existing subjects that could enrich the curricula, in all six engineering courses. The subjects are: environmental science, business management, humanities, process control and automation.
The environmental issues
At present, the six engineering curricula at the UFMG have a course called environmental protection, given in the last period. In spite of the quality of the course it is not enough to make graduating engineers aware of all the necessary issues.
Three different proposals for the environmental aspects were pointed out, as follows:
To determinate which of the above will be implemented, the Department of Environmental and Sanitary Engineering (DESA), was made responsible for this project, making application form which were then distributed to all the 265 professors. This application tried to identify, at first, if the contents taught in each specific course had some kind of environmental impact and, in case of affirmative answer, the kind of impact (air, soil, water pollution). Second, professors were asked about the best way to insert environmental aspects in their courses and how they wanted to do this. In the case of the professors that wanted to insert the environmental aspects in theirs courses the application form asked them to choose one of the following options: i) to receive, from DESA professors, an adequate trainee program; ii) to have a professor from DESA teaching the environmental subjects of their courses. With this application changes in the curricula will be made.
Insertion of control and automation
The present curricula do not prepare the Bachelor in engineering for today's industries, that work on automation bases.
The discipline control and automation is, at present, restricted to the Electrical and Mechanical Engineering Course curriculum, under the responsibility of the Electronic Department. The proposal is to offer elective courses of control and automation to the other four courses.
Management and humanity issues
The engineering curricula in Brazil have a small humanity and social science contents. The only courses offered by the Arts Faculty at the UFMG for the Engineering students are: sociology and technical writing.
The discussion during the Modernization Program showed the necessity for an increase in the above areas, in the sense of preparing the student for a social role in engineering activities, to develop a more critical analyze of the social and politic life in the country and to be able to communicate well in more than one language, one of them being English.
Experience with courses offered by the Arts Faculty to engineering students have not been successful. Usually, the students are very unmotivated, because of this there was an agreement between the engineering professors that it would be necessary to ask for changes and a new methodology of teaching.
Another agreement was that part of the humanities disciplines, those which included the relationship between the individual and his work, would be taught by the Industrial Engineering Department. This Department works in different fields of engineering design, management and even humanities. Because of this the Department will be also responsible for management disciplines.
At present, the engineering curricula at the UFMG do not emphasize management disciplines. The employers of Brazilian industries have complained with respect to this fact, that has been considered a failure in engineering education.
THE PRESENT STAGE OF THE MODERNIZATION PROGRAM
The Program approved by REENGE received financial support from two Brazilian agencies: CAPES and CNPq, each one contributing US$ 454,000. In the case of CNPq the money was restricted to personnel use.
The funds from CAPES were used to install a computer network made available to all undergraduate students. The computer network is an important infrastructure to aid in the proposal of decreased class hours, because it will permit easy access to information, throughout the world, by students.
The CNPq funds were used to contract full time engineers, consultants and also undergraduate and graduate students, for a two year period. These persons have been contributing to the development of the Modernization Program, in its specific projects.
With respect to the structure changes the results obtained were:
With respect to curricula contents the following results were obtained:
In spite of the optimistic results discussed above, no progress has been made with respect to social, humanity and management issues in the curricula.
For example, the Arts Faculty has concluded that it will not be possible to offer English classes to such a large number of engineering students, due to the lack of adequate infrastructure. However, they are in a process of analyzing other possible social science activities for students. The Industrial Engineering Department has not presented its proposal for any of the three subjects stated above, either.
Another important fact which came out of the Modernization Program discussion was the creation of the seventh engineering course, Control and Automation Engineering. The course was designed according to the new concepts in engineering education promoted by the Modernization Program. Its implementation is expected for 1998.
CONCLUSION
The Modernization Program in Engineering Education at the Engineering School at the UFMG was implemented to forge a new engineering profile, one which would be equipped to deal with the changes in society and technology within Brazil and throughout the world. The main change in Brazil was the globalization of its economy that demanded a more competitive industry and, therefore, competent engineers.
For the past 20 years the undergraduate engineering courses have not been adequately evaluated in Brazil. The REENGE Program of FINEP appeared, in 1995, to modify this scenario. At the end of 1994 the Engineering School at the UFMG, under its own initiative, started its Modernization Program, which later joined with REENGE
The proposed changes in the UFMG engineering curricula involved more than simple content changes. It involved changes in the structure of the curricula and, principally, changes in the methodology of teaching.
The Program is expected to be a success as it has been built on a foundation of participation and agreement from those who are responsible for the changes: the professors and students.
REFERENCES
1- FINEP - Termo de Referência do Edital do REENGE, july, 1995
2- Salum, M. J. G. The Brazilian Engineering Education - UFMG Case. Conference in: First International Seminar on Engineering Development Programs, Rio de Janeiro, september, 1995
3- Dau/MEC. A Nova Concepção de Ensino de Engenharia no Brasil, MEC, Maio, 1997
4- UFMG, Avaliação da Evasão na UFMG- Relatório da Pró- Reitoria de Graduação, 1995