On the Reorganization of Mathematics Education Motivated by New Challenges in Engineering

Educating generations of engineers who understand and can use mathematics as a tool requires reforming the educational process and redefining the role of engineering mathematics. This is only possible if all stakeholders in education understand that the issues of mathematical modeling and computation in models must be consciously presented in professional subjects and cannot be treated separately in the subject of mathematics. This process can be initiated by transforming mathematics education. In this article, the main elements of a complex methodology are summarized and one important element of it, the change of the calculus curriculum aimed at preparing the learning of control theory with the early introduction of discrete-time modeling, is presented. In the context of calculus, mathematics educators can support the general goal of model-centered teaching by writing down concepts, laws, and equations in discrete time and showing how the values of certain quantities (state variables, output) evolve in dynamic systems. We believe that the early application of the “discrete-time” approach (before the theoretical discussion of numerical analysis) creates a link between abstract mathematics and the “tangible” world for students. To motivate the students, a modeling-centered method is used, which means that the goal, the toolset, and the application of modeling must be emphasized at every point in the education, starting from the first week of the university studies.