Engineering is increasingly understood as a lifelong learning pathway rather than an event that happens only in a university setting. The National Academy of Engineering's the Engineer of 2020 identifies lifelong learning, practical ingenuity, analytic skills, business management, creativity, cognitive flexibility, ethics, leadership, professionalism, and communication as the knowledge and skills that will be valuable for engineers in the future. These skills can be learned both within, and outside of, traditional engineering education. In order to understand how engineering education manifests during the course of a life, or how engineering skills and mindsets are acquired later in life, it is vital to understand how skills, knowledge, and tacit knowledge are built. This paper explores one method for discovering how engineers are made, both through traditional and non-traditional processes. We explored the life pathways of Makers, an interdisciplinary collective of engineers, scientists, hobbyists, and artists who are focused on the creation of physical artifacts that usually incorporate technology. This group embraces many of the traits highlighted in the Engineer of 2020, with specific focus on lifelong learning, practical ingenuity, creativity, and cognitive flexibility. To do so, we used a combination of qualitative techniques for data collection including a screening questionnaire, artifact elicitation interviews, and critical incident interviews. This paper, part of a larger work in progress by the authors, will expand on the collection methods used in order to inform others of possible approaches for understanding the skills learned and pathways taken by a sector of the adult community who embody many of the qualities vital to the engineer of 2020. In addition, by exploring the life pathways of makers, we can begin to see how classically trained engineers renew their passion for engineering and how adult non-engineers learn and engage with engineering skills and knowledge. By presenting a method for assessing the skills learned by Makers along with descriptive examples of adults engaged in engineer-esque activities, we hope to further the conversation surrounding educating the engineer of the future.
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