Poetry in Engineering Education

An important element of integrating disciplines and enhancing creativity in Drexel University's engineering curriculum is an assignment which combines poetry and engineering. For this assignment, students choose an artifact, research it, create a one-page annotated visual explaining how it works, and then write an original poem about it. Although the poetry instruction, based on a transactional model, takes place in the Humanities classroom, student poems become a component of a concurrent engineering assignment and are read aloud in an engineering lecture, attended by humanities faculty, designated as the “Poetry Reading.” Short in length and having a distinct design on the page, poetry is a particularly suitable literary medium for engineering students to explore. Students relinquish stereotypes about engineers when they see their engineering professor endorse poetry. They also begin to broaden their educational and professional goals.