Despite the increasing magnitude and frequency of disasters, it remains unclear whether civil engineers possess the ability to understand disaster risk and design resilient infrastructures.

This episode features Anup Shrestha from Water and Development Research Group, School of Engineering, Aalto University (Finland).

We talk about the winner of the ‘Best Student Paper’ at the SEFI 2025 Conference entitled “Are Disaster-Prone Countries’ Undergraduate Students Prepared? Insights from a Civil Engineering Program in Nepal” which Anup co-authored with Julia Sundman, Josias Láng-Ritter, Maija Taka, Olli Varis (Aalto University) and Sudeep Lamsal (Sagarmatha Engineering College).

The paper considers the degree to which undergraduate civil engineering students in disaster-prone countries are adequately prepared. The research involves the use of a questionnaire to evaluate Nepalese students’ knowledge of Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), resilience concepts, and related competencies. Students were found to exhibit DRR knowledge, but had limited opportunities to participate in DRR courses, workshops, or training. Whilst they possessed the basic concepts of resilience, there was a notable gap in their ability to apply these concepts in designing resilient structures. The research team thus suggest that additional efforts focus on integrating these competencies into engineering curricula.

For the full paper, follow this link:https://acris.aalto.fi/ws/portalfiles/portal/202473945/SEFI2025_040.pdf

This is the third episode from the new SEFI Podcast: Publication Spotlight series which aims to complement our normal, longer length shows. In these episodes, we speak with authors of recent publications to bring you up to date with some of the latest work within engineering education.

Timestamps

0.00 Welcome and introduction

0.27 Introduction to the episode an publication

1.08 How the work came about and the research team

4.25 Summary of the work

5.18 The research gap

7.36 Disaster risk reduction (DRR)

10.58 The research questions

12.10 Methodology

13.38 The findings

16.58 Implications for engineering education research and practice

20.24 Contextual differences

22.48 Staff and student perceptions to integrating DRR and resilience

26.27 What's next?

Join us! Become a member of the European Society for Engineering

Education, SEFI, Europe's largest network of engineering

educators: www.sefi.be

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The rising complexity of modern societal challenges has intensified interest in interdisciplinary engineering education.

In this episode we speak to Professor Anette Kolmos (Professor in Engineering Education and PBL) and Dr Henrik Worm Routhe (Postdoctoral Researcher) from Aalborg University (AAU) in Denmark, about InterPBL and the different approaches that can be taken to interdisciplinary learning and teaching.

Join Dr. Natalie Wint (University College London) and Prof. Neil Cooke (University of Birmingham) to learn about the many different ways in which we can integrate interdisciplinary projects into our engineering courses.

Timestamps

0.00 Welcome and introduction to episode

0.25 Podcast Intro

0.52 Experiences with interdisciplinary from Natalie and Neil

2.30 Introduction to Anette and Henrik

7.20 Aalborg University (AAU)

9.18 Introduction to InterPBL

13.00 Examples of the challenges associated with interdisciplinary project work

14.34 Aims of the InterPBL project

17.04 Interdisciplinary in engineering practice

21.00 Definitions

24.25 Cognitive trust and boundary objects

31.00 How does interdisciplinary work impact identity?

35.28 A typology of interdisciplinary projects

48.32 Students' motivation

50.57 Leadership

55.21 Assessment of interdisciplinary

58.41 Implications for staff and capacity building

1:00:50 Measuring the effectiveness of interdisciplinary learning and teaching

1:05:40 Introducting interdisciplinary in your own context

1:09:56 Mega-projects (M-Project) and broad interdisciplinary

1:15:25 Key Takeaways and implications from Anette and Henrik

1:25:38 What is next for research in this area?

1:28:48 Key takeaways from Natalie and Neil

Resources

A small sample of papers which focus on the InterPBL project are linked below

This paper focuses on student learning outcomes of interdisciplinary work

https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10171180

This provides insights from a narrow interdisciplinary curriculum project named “leadENG

https://vbn.aau.dk/en/publications/interdisciplinary-problem-based-projects-for-first-year-engineeri/

This paper focuses on development of leadership competencies

https://vbn.aau.dk/ws/portalfiles/portal/752930995/17_ijee4479.pdf

These papers focus on the different project types

https://www.mdpi.com/2227-7102/15/2/138

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03043797.2023.2267476

Join us! Become a member of the European Society for Engineering

Education, SEFI, Europe's largest network of engineering

educators: www.sefi.be

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Although recognised as a priority for engineering education, implementation of Sustainable Development (SD) in curricula has been mixed and limited.

This episode features Marie Paretti from Virginia Tech and Maya Menon from the EdTech startup NextWork. We talk about a paper published in the European Journal of Engineering Education entitled “Understanding instructor decision-making in engineering education for sustainable development: a comparison of institutions in Denmark and the United States” which Maya and Marie co-authored with Jennifer Case and Andrew Katz. The study compared the external, internal (institutional) and individual influences on instructors’ decision-making, in relation to the incorporation of SD into the courses they teach within institutions in two different national contexts.

This episode is the second in our series of episodes that take on a new format and are released at intervals along with our normal longer length shows.

For the full paper, follow this link: https://doi.org/10.1080/03043797.2025.2486189

Timestamps

0.00 Welcome and introduction

0.29 Introduction to the episode an publication

1.25 How the work came about and the research team

3.12 Summary of the work

4.02 The research gap

5.16 The research questions

7.27 Terminology; Sustainability, Sustainable Development and the UN SDGs

10.50 Theoretical underpinnings

13.58 Comparative Case Study Methodology

18.04 Data sources and analysis

21.12 The findings

29:49 Implications for engineering education practice

32.31 Implications for engineering education research

35.23 Goodbyes

Join us! Become a member of the European Society for Engineering

Education, SEFI, Europe's largest network of engineering

educators: www.sefi.be

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.