2003:20 R

Evaluation of undergraduate programmes in engineering and fire protection engineering at higher education institutions in Sweden

To increase recruitment the institutions have created new programmes with attractive names. Several institutions have also broadened their recruitment, mainly by accepting students who have completed social science options in upper-secondary school. The panel of assessors takes a positive view of these measures, but in several cases the content of these new programmes is weak from a mathematics/natural sciences perspective and/or technology. The core of the engineering discipline has been eroded, which means that some programmes cannot be considered to maintain the standard required. Of a total of 225 programmes evaluated, 28 display shortcomings in terms of their mathematics or technology content.

At many institutions students can be awarded both a certificate in engineering and a bachelor´s degree after completion of their programmes. There is, however, some lack of clarity about the distinctions between them, which is unfortunate for both students and future employers and from the point of view of international comparisons.

Quality assurance reveals shortcomings at a number of institutions, as evidenced for instance by the varying quality of the term papers. Better cooperation and benchmarking is recommended as an important element of quality assurance.

The teachers, of whom the vast majority are junior lecturers, are often extremely committed and the students highly motivated. The number of professors in the teaching staff is generally speaking low.

The teachers´ heavy workloads means that there is far too little time for the in-service training and skill enhancement required. The lack of any opportunity to carry out research and skill enhancement reduces the chances of improving the programmes´ links with research, which in the opinion of the panel of assessors need to be augmented at most of the institutions involved in the evaluation.

The numbers of qualifications awarded in programmes leading to certificates or bachelor´s degrees in engineering are lower than the average figures in other vocationally oriented programmes.

The panel of assessors observe that cooperation with the labour market is important and should be enhanced. Here both the higher education institutions and industry share a joint responsibility. For instance, both should be involved in a joint endeavour to provide the relevant work placement positions needed during programmes.

Little has been achieved in the internationalisation of undergraduate programmes in engineering at most of the institutions, which is serious as the future labour market for these students will be an international one.