Strengthening the training of engineers in Chilean universities through practice partnerships: STING Project

Abstract The Technische Universitat Dresden (TU Dresden), Faculty of Education and the Universidad de Santiago de Chile (USACH) Faculty of Engineering, collaborate for the period from01.01.2017 to 31.12.2020 in the research and development project " Strengthening engineering training at Chilean universities through practice partnerships, STING Project (in german “Starkung derIngenieurausbildung an chilenischenHochschulen durch Praxispartnerschaften"). This paper presents goals, activities and results of the STING Project, focused on the needs of academic training related to the different pedagogical and technological aspects that influence the training of engineers in the engineering faculty of the USACH. The STING-Project is oriented to the development and testing of training modules for students (either for electrical or mechanical engineers) and teaching qualifications of teaching staff in academic engineering education based in demands and employment- requirements of German and Chilean companies. For this reason, was developed a questionnaire by the TU Dresden and the USACH as part of a stage of information gathering to obtain the strategic positioning and future development of the participant enterprises. The goal of the application of this questionnaire is to know the opinion of strategic staff of the enterprises regarding the actual needs and the projected future scenario for engineers and the type of “technology transferences” between university-company. The results of this survey were used in the development of two training modules for students at the USACH. This project is financially supported by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) as part ofthe program "PraxispartnerschaftenZwischenHochschulen und Unternehmen in Deutschlandund in Entwicklungslandern ab 2017“