Do We Design for People or to Make Things?: Student Motivations, Barriers and Mindsets in an International Humanitarian Engineering Experience

Service-learning has emerged as an effective pedagogy that develops participants' cognitive and affective competencies through working with communities and applying their education in realworld settings.In engineering, service-learning projects help participants shift their focus from the device or design to the people who will use it.In February 2023, 17 engineering students traveled to Honduras with the goal of designing a sustainable water system in partnership with a rural community.The students who attended the international experience were invited to participate in a study through completing a pre-and post-trip survey.Similarly, the students who originally planned to go on the trip but decided not to attend also completed a survey.Items on the instruments inquired about participants' motivations and barriers to attend this international humanitarian trip.Additionally, the study explored whether students' mindsets shifted from being thing-focused to being more people-focused during the experience.Participants returning from the trip were significantly more people-focused than before the experience, and they cited their favorite part of the experience was the relationships that they developed.Motivating factors to attend were to gain engineering experience, travel to a new place, and provide for others.Over half of the participants who ultimately decided not to go cited financial reasons and the time commitment as large barriers.Surprisingly, health and safety and the great travel distance were not barriers for them, nor were they a concern for participants who returned from the experience.It was found that international students were especially disadvantaged as additional transit visas were required for them to travel to the destination.The findings suggest a need to make the experience more inclusive and to further investigate how these experiences can contribute to students' becoming more person-oriented.