The next change in socio technical education will be taking in account social and environmental justice. This is an alteration that Lafayette must enact in order to follow the trend. Engineering has evolved immensely over the course of history. In the world we live in today, bias in technology leaves negative effects on underprivileged people. Engineering and technology must adjust to be the best for all people on this planet. The triple bottom line being people, planet, and profit, all are currently in need of more emphasis. People represent the relation to the impacts of an organization on the stakeholders involved including employees, customers, and others. Planet is defined as the impacts of an organization or entity on the natural environment in relation to its carbon footprint and so on. Lastly, profit is the impact of an organization or entity on the local, national, and global economy including employment, innovation, taxes, and more (Forbes, 2019). All three of these need to be evaluated in our current climate to improve technology for all. Negative results of technology are holding back from prosperity of people and the prosperity of the planet. An evaluation of the triple bottom line in today’s world comes down to an analysis and need for change in social and environmental contexts. Without change in these core areas, engineering and technology will never reach its full potential. At Lafayette, in Acopian and the Engineering Studies major specifically, these areas of focus need to be included in the curriculum in some manner. Without them, Lafayette will be behind the trend in engineering education. Engineering Studies at Lafayette was created as a socio-technical major in response to criticism of advancements in engineers back engineering back in 1970. Adding social and environmental justice to the existing curriculum is a shift in engineering that must be tackled head on.
Engineering Studies, formerly known as AB Engineering, was originally described that “Lafayette can profit from its combination of arts, sciences, and engineering programs” (The Lafayette, 1970 p.6). Over fifty years later, a similar description of Engineering Studies is denoted by all of its beneficiaries. In the 60s and 70s, there was an expressed need for more humanitarian engineering within the industry and society. With schools such as UCLA, Harvey Mudd, MIT, and Caltech, leading the charge of humanitarian engineering and with the goal to “impart technical skill with moral content,” Lafayette was not far behind when implementing their own science and technology studies major (Engineers for Change, 2016, p.170). Now, there is a transition in how we as students, scholars, and everyone alike, should assess engineering and technology. There is always the question of “Is vs. Ought” that is posed to analyze whether a technology that is fully operational and could easily be put into society, should actually be put to use. With new innovation being made available in such great frequency, there are new negative effects that question these said advancements. These questions must be asked by the Lafayette community, and that can be evaluated in the Engineering Studies curriculum.
We propose an overhaul and revamping of the Engineering Studies curriculum. The major must integrate everything that it presents to us in a cohesive way, and it must present to us the most significant issues in technology. Our Engineering Studies vision for the future can be presented in the form of a cake. There are three layers to the cake as listed from the base to the top: environmental justice, social justice, and economic justice. All must be put to the forefront of our curriculum. Starting off with environmental justice as the base. Second comes social justice, which is a focus on racial justice. And lastly, there is economic justice. Each one, if not successfully targeted can cause a ripple effect on the next layer, and all are so important for the core of the Engineering Studies curriculum and its success. Sometimes, these layers of economic, social, and environmental justice can seem more like icing than the cake itself. With aspects of what the curriculum poses not acting as a core principle of the major, the set up of the program as a whole must be reevaluated. The Lafayette website states that “The Engineering Studies Program brings together the four divisions of campus-engineering, humanities, science, social sciences- for a truly liberal arts education” (Program-Engineering Studies, 2020). Even though this is consistent with what the major originally set out to be as referenced in The Lafayette article from 1970, the execution must be updated to encompass not only new issues, but conflicts that are new in the space of technology.
Figure 1
These conflicts of environmental justice, social justice, and economic justice have always been recognized, but not in the sense of the world of engineering and technology. With the boom of social media, the development of algorithms, and other advancements, these issues of justice have been brought to the world’s attention. In our report, We will present an evaluation of the social context, political context, economic context, and the implementation of a new curriculum. For social context, there will be a focus on society and how race and environment are key players in engineering. For political context, we will assess policy and how the addition of social and environmental justice are seen in engineering and education. We will also analyze the economic context, and how the resources are allocated within Lafayette College. There will also be information on how a lack of diversity disallows the industry from reaching its full potential. Lastly, we will speak on the implementation of how our findings should enhance the major to encompass more of how it is presented.
With this report, we will look to the newly created Hanson Center of Inclusive STEM at Lafayette. They set out to “tackle the lack of inclusion within the scientific disciplines, a common trend throughout United States universities” (The Lafayette, 2019). The Hanson Center came into existence from a $5 million gift from Daniel and Heidi Hanson of the 1991 class in 2017. Allison Byerly, Lafayette College’s current President mentioned, “[Heidi Hanson] was interested in making a substantial gift that would help us with recruiting underrepresented students and she’s been supportive of some of those efforts in the past” (Lafayette Student News, 2019). With our goal of making the major more racially and environmentally aware, we believe our report to the Hanson Center will be groundwork to help improve Acopian and Lafayette Engineering. We also intend it to give justice to all students, no matter what their background may be. With any change in the schools system, there are certainly many factors involved, one being funding of programs. Additional funding is a necessity for the expansion of inclusive STEM, and only time will tell if the investment from the Hanson’s to Lafayette College will be the answer to the issues presented.
Although there is no current solution, there are several ways that social and environmental justice can be incorporated in engineering in the classroom. Several ideas including cross listed courses, adding courses, adding a professor, and more have been contemplated by current professors involved in the EGRS (Engineering Studies) program. The current Engineering Studies program at Lafayette has a core set of courses that gives knowledge to students and allows them to evaluate issues on a socio technical level. With the change in socio technical conflicts today in the world around us, there must be a change in the curriculum of the program. In order for an adequate solution to be successfully implemented, an evaluation of several contexts have been done and are explained in this report. From information gathered within the Lafayette community and beyond, there will be an expression of the desired future path of the Engineering Studies major and Acopian of how justice can be incorporated into the curriculum. With social and environmental justice being the main priorities for implementation, they will both be the basis of this report.
Next page: Social Context