ENGINEERING EDUCATION IN COMMUNITY SERVICE

Recently, the number of high school students who are applying to engineering departments in Japan has been dwindling. The unpopularity of engineering education has several negative results. Students with lower motivation, lower scientific ability, and a weak sense of professional and ethical responsibility are being admitted to engineering programs. In order to make the engineering field more attractive and address some of these deficits, our Institute determined that learning that combines engineering education and “real-world” experience was important. Thus, we started a subject area called “Community Service” in 2001. This paper introduces the programs included in Community Service at Shonan Institute of Technology. The outcomes from these programs are evaluated.