The Ethical Dimension of Emerging Technologies in Engineering Education

Emerging technologies are part of the constituting datafication and digitalization process that poses major challenges to the current educational infrastructure. Clearly, universities are challenged to respond to the demands that seem to develop faster and become more complex over time. The complexity, though, is not just technical; it is the combination of technology, and specifically big data use, with job requirements, educational practices, ethical responsibilities, and the socio-cultural aspects of education. The purpose of this paper is to analyze and discuss elements of these issues in trying to clarify the complexity and lower the threshold for those who are involved and to look for a better understanding of the opportunities and challenges. Therefore, different issues related to emerging technologies are discussed, with a focus on big data and artificial intelligence, as core technologies, followed by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic as a societal development, the EdTech industry, and the ethical dimensions of the technological change and the consequences for education. Ethics have been shown to be of value, also, in times of increasing complexity and can guide the use and development of emerging technologies in higher education.