Incorporating general education components into an engineering curriculum

Engineering curricula should provide a graduate not only with specialized knowledge in a particular engineering subject but should also infuse general skills and abilities in preparation for life of work. The General Education part of a curriculum can be the source of such transferable intellectual skills as critical thinking, written and oral communication, problem solving and teamwork. The paper presents an assessment of an attempt to introduce General Education into curricula at the University of Botswana, with special emphasis on engineering students. It shows general education courses enrolment realities over a period of 12 academic years. It contrasts the results with the previous study covering a shorter period of time. The paper concludes that the attempt of the broadening the perspective of students by the introduction of the general education courses was not successful. The engineering students were not getting the broad education that general education courses were designed for. The same applied to students with limited elements of science and technology in their university curriculum as general education courses from Science and Technology area attracted almost no students from other faculties. The paper proposes a different model for incorporation of general education into the curriculum. © 2017 TEMPUS Publications.