Economic Impact for Integrating Constructivism, Project-Based Learning and Practice into High Quality Professional Graduate Education for Engineers in Industry to Enhance Corporate Advantage and U.S. Competitiveness in the Global Economy

摘要

This is the fourth of four papers prepared for a special panel session of the National Collaborative Task Force on Engineering Graduate Education Reform focusing on new educational approaches and processes that better meet the development needs of the U.S. engineering workforce in industry to enhance global competitiveness. Further graduate development of the U.S. engineering workforce in industry is critical to the continuous improvement, invention, development, and innovation of new technology which is the engine for U.S. economic prosperity and competitiveness. This paper focuses on a unique model for workforce development that represents a significant advancement in professional graduate education extending through the professional masters, professional doctorate and fellow levels of engineering practice. This advancement in professional graduate education forms a new partnership for university-industry engagement for U.S. engineering workforce development that completes a missing piece of the process to better enable U.S. technological innovation which is long overdue. The impact of project-based learning on industrial innovation is evidenced. This model is designed specifically to support the on-site engineering process for continuous improvement and innovation in industry. It purposefully integrates postgraduate professional education for industry's employed engineers with on-site technology development projects that are chosen to be directly relevant to industry's continuous innovation needs and high-end engineering projects. The returns for enhanced corporate advantage generated through this unique model are measured as a matrix of increasing complexity of economic worth of on-site projects and of increasing human proficiency gained for leadership of technological innovation.