Graduate courses for the development of academic staff in engineering education

The UNESCO International Centre for Engineering Education (UICEE) has recently undertaken a new project to develop and implement a number of graduate courses in engineering education with the objective to facilitate the development of educational skills of engineering personnel in academia, schools, government and industry. In particular, this has been done in recognition of the urgent need to prepare graduate engineers to become engineering academic teachers and effective tertiary education trainers, a factor generally overlooked in the total preparation of academics for their role in the university. The range and structure of fully articulated graduate courses, commencing with a Certificate in Engineering Education and terminating with a Master of Engineering Education, are presented in this paper. The designed subjects include concepts, topics and ideas relevant to the university teaching/learning environment in order to assist graduate engineers to become effective future supervisors and managers of learning in the higher education sector. A wide range of issues, including the developmental methodology are addressed and discussed in the paper.