IMPACTS AND ETHICS OF BIOTECHNOLOGY AS A VEHICLE FOR ASSESSING CEAB OUTCOMES IN A FIRST YEAR CHEMICAL ENGINEERING COURSE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF WATERLOO

The CEAB outcomes “Impact of Engineering on Society and the Environment”, and “Ethics and Equity” differ from the majority of the technical content of engineering curricula. These outcomes largely involve the affective learning domain rather than the cognitive domain. Teaching and measuring affective domain outcomes can be challenging and has received limited attention in engineering curriculum. To help address this disconnect, we have selected to integrate ethical considerations within an engineering course, namely the first year Engineering Biology course of the Chemical Engineering program at University of Waterloo. This learning activity was successful in providing an opportunity for students to establish a sense of awareness as to the impact of engineering on society and the environment. It also created opportunities for students to practice and develop their communication skills. Next steps should consider the potential need to formally expose students to the ethical decision making process and to evaluate if this type of teaching has modified the student awareness of ethics, social values and responsibilities of the engineer. In this paper, we will comment on the successes and challenges faced in promoting student learning and fairness in a structured panel format learning activity. The careful design of assessment tools will also be discussed.