Integrating Sustainability Education in a Classical Civil Engineering Program: The Case of Transportation and Construction Courses

Abstract

Sustainability has emerged as a common theme in many processes related to urban life and the built environment. However, most engineering curricula still lacks the fundamentals of sustainable practices education that prepares graduating engineers to fulfill their expected roles and conduct future business in a more sustainable fashion. A more sustainable Civil Engineering curriculum requires a more systems approach to both diagnosing transport and built environment problems as well as devising solutions to such problems. This paper examines typical engineering curricula and identifies specific courses in the areas of transportation and construction where sustainability can be injected with minimum disruption to the structure of the course and/or its connection to other courses with the intended degree. For the two subspecialties, the core and elective courses are categorized and certain areas/modules within each course are identified, where the integration of sustainable engineering education is useful. Furthermore, some educational tools that facilitate the infusion of these concepts into the two subspecialties are presented.