The ABET 2000 Criteria for Engineering Programs provide us with anew roadmap for engineering education. The guidelines call fordemonstrated competence in the practice of engineering. That competenceincludes a strong sense of how engineering practice fits into a societalframework on a local and a global level. At the same time the number ofmodern design tools has increased tremendously, the impact ofengineering activity on the lives of everyone in society has increased,the engineering basics are unchanged and we still have only 4-5 years toprepare our students to become engineers. With new guidelines andincreased demands, perhaps a modified or new approach to instructionwould be helpful. The author discusses a design-based approach toteaching that meets these criteria and that also includes concepts ofservice and ethical responsibility. This approach has been usedsuccessfully by the author in numerous courses and has also been usedvery successfully to introduce environmentally responsible designpractice for freshman through senior level courses
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