The University of Arizona is among more than 120 U.S. engineering schools leading a transformative movement in engineering education announced March 23 at the White House. 

In a letter presented to President Barack Obama, the UA and other signatory institutions committed to establish special educational programs designed to prepare undergraduates to solve “Grand Challenges” -- complex yet achievable goals defined by the National Academy of Engineering to improve national and international health, security, sustainability and quality of life in the 21st century. Together, the schools plan to graduate more than 20,000 formally recognized “Grand Challenge Engineers” over the next decade.

“The NAE Grand Challenges outline a framework of critical societal problems for which engineering ideas provide solutions,” said Jeff Goldberg, dean of the UA College of Engineering. “Working on such important problems excites our students and provides a clear motivation for studying engineering.

“These problems require technical approaches, but they also require integrating the solution into an existing social structure. Teamwork, communication and leadership skills are critical for success. The UA College of Engineering’s Grand Challenge Program includes a variety of nontraditional skills that enable our students to tackle these Grand Challenges for the betterment of society.”

The UA College of Engineering’s Grand Challenge Engineers will take part in special programs that integrate five educational elements: a hands-on research or design project connected to the Grand Challenges; real-world, interdisciplinary experiential learning with clients and mentors; entrepreneurship and innovation experience; global and cross-cultural perspectives; and service-learning.

“The UA College of Engineering is in the business of creating leaders," Goldberg said. "These leaders need to be strong in design and technical ideas, of course, but success at this scale requires skills in communication, leadership, teamwork, trust, delegation, and intuition, and UA College of Engineering programs are designed to endow our students with these skills.”

For details about the initiative, go to www.nae.edu.

Top picture: The White House from the South Lawn (CC BY-SA 3.0)