TOWARDS A SUSTAINABLE BUILT ENVIRONMENT IN THE UNITED ARAB EMIRATES REVISITING THE PEDAGOGICAL MODEL FOR EDUCATING THE YOUNGER GENERATION OF ENGINEERS

In addition to the fact that the U.A.E. is the fastest growing nation in the world today, it has one of the highest levels of energy consumption per capita in the world. Buildings in the UAE, consume more than 45% of total energy use; 25% of total water consumption; 70% of total electricity consumption, and 40% of total carbon dioxide emissions. The country is currently encouraging and adopting strategies which further enhance sustainable development and growth. Taking into consideration that the building industry is one of the country’s most developed and fastest growing sectors, embedding sustainability at the systems as well as the planning levels is now essential.
Engineering undergraduate programs in the country are rich, with diverse disciplines and course offerings. However, the component of sustainability in the engineering curricula has not been purposefully integrated to meet the proven market need for engineers equipped with the sustainability background. This paper argues the role which engineering education can play in the current transformation occurring in the building industry towards sustainability.
This role is demonstrated by an individual pedagogical practice which was successfully initiated and developed at the Architectural Engineering (AE) program, U.A.E. University. In a collaborative, real-life scenario, the senior environmental design studio aims at embedding sustainability in a “pre-scribed” architectural engineering design process. The course position within the curriculum, its structure, composition, pedagogical practices and course atmosphere are detailed as a practice of problem-based learning (PBL), which has proven successes as an approach for teaching sustainability in a design studio.
This unique teaching-learning experience is influenced by the social, physical and learning contexts which groups of students experience. These contexts reflect on the class activities, students’ performance and accordingly on the overall pedagogical model.
This paper is concluded by a revised iteration for the typical engineering education model, which aims at supporting the integration of sustainability in the engineering curricula, taking into consideration the uniqueness in the teaching-learning contexts.