https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8976-6202

Today I was rummaging the Internet looking for my previous works and publications, as I always do, just like most other academics are prone to do, at least the academics I am acquainted with, and they are many. And guess what, I came across a talk I presented at UCL in 2017, exactly four years after I joined the UCL Engineering flagship programme framework – the Integrated Engineering Programme, or IEP, in short.

In this talk I reflect on public perceptions of engineering, as well as the great history of British Engineering. I start off with a quote from Jeremy Clarkson, yes, Jeremy Clarkson of the motoring TV programmes Top Gear and The Grand Tour fame. Jeremy Clarkson has a weird way of interpreting the world of motoring, and as an engineer I find myself disagreeing with him throughout his programmes, but sometimes he utters something that makes me look up and say “You might have a point there, Jeremy!”

And as I always do in most of my talks on engineering education, I went back to Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the great 19th century engineer, and I was publicly wondering – is the current engineering curriculum capable of producing new engineers of Brunel’s stature?

Why Brunel? He is my engineering hero, as anyone who has ever sat down with me to discuss engineering will know. And why not – everyday without fail, before the COVID-19 lockdown, I would set out, four/five days a week on my commute to UCL, and see and use some of the iconic engineering artefacts that he created or inspired. Every weekday, on my way to and fro work, I drive over the Clifton Suspension Bridge, designed by Brunel in 1831 when he was aged just 24, and completed in 1864, after he had died.

I then drive past the SS Great Britain, again designed and built by Brunel, and the first iron steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean in 1845.

I park my car, and walk into Bristol Temple Meads to catch the train to London, again travelling on a railway line first designed and built by Brunel. Thirty minutes into my train ride, I go through the Box Tunnel, the 3 kilometre long tunnel through Box Hill, near Bath, built under Brunel’s guidance, and which was the longest rail tunnel at the time of its opening in 1841.

In my talk, I concluded that our current curriculum might not possibly produce someone of Brunel’s stature, except, perhaps, by accident. However, I noted that given the ongoing curriculum changes in engineering, as exemplified by the UCL Integrated Engineering Programme, there is some possibility that this will happen someday.

Here is a link to the 2017 talk, and please, let me have your comments. It will be nice to hear from you all what you really think about emergent engineering curricula such as the UCL Integrated Engineering Programme.

Link to “Putting the creativity back into Engineering Education”: https://mediacentral.ucl.ac.uk/Play/7683