Professor presents paper on future of engineering education
Klaus Wuersig, assistant professor of engineering, presented a paper on how new fields are affecting engineering education at a conference in Poland this summer.
Wuesig presented a paper titled “How Will Renewable Energy Concepts and Nanotechnology Affect Engineering Education?” at the International Conference on Engineering Education held at Silesian University of Technology in Gliwice.
In his paper, Wuersig argues that the emerging field of renewable energy merits separate programs within engineering.
Wuersig also discussed some of the questions that would have to be answered by universities before the could create such programs, including how faculty from different departments would work together to create inter-disciplinary courses in solar energy, wind power, biodiesel, ethanol, biomass, geothermal, fossil fuels and nuclear energy.
Wuersig pointed to nanotechnology, the creation of microscopic and atomic-level structures, as an emerging field that now has its own department within many university schools of engineering.
Wuersig retired from the State University of New York in 1998 as a full professor.
From 1998 to 2000, he was part of a team that set up programs in information technology, mathematics and science at a brand new university for women in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. He also spent a year from 1995 to 1996 setting up programs in electrical engineering at the University Technology Malaysia in Batu Pahat, Malaysia.
He has presented numerous papers on engineering education at international conferences in Brazil, Germany, Poland, Puerto Rico and the United States.
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