ENGAGING STUDENTS ORIENTED TOWARDS USEFULNESS IN A BILDUNG-ORIENTED ENGINEERING EDUCATION

In the context of engineering education, there has been a turn toward seeing the future engineer as an agent in society, resolving perceivingly more complex problems, often in cooperation with representatives from other professions. Simultaneously, this more system-perspective and citizen-oriented turn in engineering education connects the education closer to the idea of Bildung, where students are expected not only to become practitioners of a craft, but also active participants in society. This paper discusses the contentious relationship between the concepts of Bildung and usefulness, where a theoretical discussion contrasting different traditions and forms of Bildung is illuminated by datasets from 1700 1st year bachelor engineering students across four consecutive years and these students’ motivations toward Bildung-oriented topics. The students’ profession-oriented motivations and orientation toward usefulness suggest that a Bildung-oriented education based on the idea that there is a conflict between usefulness and Bildung will be unsuccessful in motivating these students to engage themselves in society. An education for engineering Bildung should thus be based on integrating the ideas of usefulness into the concept of Bildung.