Chemical engineering and chemistry: education in a changing world

Abstract

Current trends in science and engineering research are analyzed, together with an inventory of changes in the field of employment and practice in industry. The resulting demands on the university education of chemists and chemical engineers have been translated into a more or less continuous updating of the curriculum at the Department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry of the Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands. In general it can be said that the emphasis within education will have to shift from the knowledge of facts, towards the ability to apply this knowledge to the process of solving problems in a realistic setting. Two topics will be highlighted. Multidisciplinary project group work was successfully introduced to enable students to apply theoretical knowledge to real life situations in a professional (industrial) context, resulting among others in a sharper focus on communication skills. On the other hand, knowledge of theory and experimental practice are combined and augmented by the increased use of experiment simulations for illustration, demonstration and experimentation purposes. Here, the increased use of information technology facilities and skills is essential.

Keywords

• chemistry
• chemical engineering
• education
• trends
• group work
• projects
• experiment simulation