Exploration of Skills Needed for Graduate-Level Community Engaged Learning in Engineering

Community-engaged learning in graduate engineering programs has had growing attention in engineering education research to prepare researchers for supporting communities in solving complex problems. As a practice, community-engaged learning in engineering struggles to achieve equitable outcomes for community partners because students in such programs may lack skills or possess charity or patriarchal mindsets. A charity mindset is characterized by an uncritical desire to help, with Western engineering deemed favourable over community knowledge systems resulting in the design of solutions that try to address symptoms of inequity without meaningful community involvement. With the increase of community-driven and engaged learning in engineering graduate studies, pushed by research agencies and the marketing of large-scaled international grand challenges, the development of engagement skills in graduation education is needed. In this paper, we highlight the specific successes and challenges faced by one graduate student and their supervisors undertaking community-engaged learning. We explore these issues while embedded in a project with three Indigenous communities on improving resilience in an engineering procurement and construction (EPC) process for healthcare facilities in Indigenous communities by incorporating cultural and social factors. We bring forward these successes and challenges to build a conversation around designing curricula for engineering-engaged learning skills for graduate students.