EXPERIENCES FROM APPLYING THE CDIO STANDARD FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN INSTITUTION-WIDE PROGRAM EVALUATIONS

In the CDIO standards 3.0, the original “core” CDIO standards have been updated regarding sustainable development. In addition, one of the new, so called “optional”, CDIO standards addresses sustainable development. This paper puts the new CDIO standard for sustainable development to test, in an institution-wide evaluation of engineering education programs at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology. First, the standard is operationalized by establishing a set of indicators and slightly modifying the standard rubrics. Then, it is used in the evaluation of a large number of programs on bachelor and master level. Examples are given of the evaluation outcomes, and the character of the integration of sustainable development in programs on different rubric levels are discussed. With the proposed indicators and rubric modifications, the new standard is concluded to be a useful tool for evaluating, promoting, and guiding, integration of sustainable development, not only in programs with particularly high ambitions regarding sustainable development, but in basically any engineering program. It is recommended that the new standard, with the here proposed modifications, is used for setting university-wide goals and for providing teachers and program directors with a framework for enhancing the future relevance of engineering education programs.