Preparing the Engineers of Tomorrow: Standards Education for Infrastructure Improvement and Resilience

Standards are pivotal in managing safety, security, and risk across industries, facilitating innovation and societal resilience.However, gaps in standards literacy persist among future professionals, hindering their ability to navigate evolving technological advancements in society.This study addresses the need for standards education within higher education institutions, particularly in disciplines crucial for infrastructure resilience and sustainability.Our study examines the development, implementation, and assessment of portable curricular modules to foster standards literacy among undergraduate and graduate students.Drawing on the American National Standards Institute's (ANSI) advocacy, we present a case study focused on integrating standards education into environmental sustainability, health, and safety (ESHS) and environmental health and safety management (EHSM) curricula.We employ a mixed-methods approach, combining formative and summative assessment methods, including alumni surveys and student feedback, to evaluate the impact of standards literacy interventions.The findings underscore the significance of standards education in enhancing students' understanding and application of standards in real-world contexts.Moreover, the study proposes an expansion of this approach to civil engineering and cybersecurity-related programs, emphasizing the broader implications for workforce preparedness and infrastructure resilience.By highlighting the importance of standards education and offering a replicable model for curricular integration, this study contributes to advancing standards literacy initiatives within higher education and draws attention to their role in shaping the future engineering workforce.