2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Electricity access refers to the provision of electricity to populations that do not have access to the electrical grid, usually in under-resourced settings. Over 700 million people do not have access to electricity. Interest, investment, and activity in this sub-field of Humanitarian Engineering has grown considerably over the last 15 years. Yet, there is very little coverage of this topic in U.S. universities. This critical challenge can motivate students to pursue electrical engineering studies and inspire engineering students to engage with curricular and extra-curricular activities related to electricity access, making it a pivotal area for educational focus. In 2022 and 2023, the National Science Foundation sponsored two workshops with the goal of identifying approaches to enhance and expand electricity access education at the undergraduate engineering level in the U.S., primarily within the electrical engineering discipline. In this paper, we summarize and synthesize the insightful discussion from the second workshop, supplemented by results from in-workshop
polling of the participants. We identify perceptions of the state of electricity access education in the U.S., and identify needs and barriers for improving related curricular and extra-curricular activities. Finally, we propose a road map of activities for further discussion.
An initial gathering of about 25 engineering educators, field practitioners, and non-profit organization representatives participated in a first-of-its-kind NSF-sponsored workshop in June 2022. A goal of this workshop was to identify innovative approaches to enhance and expand electricity access education at the undergraduate engineering level in the United States.

Following the success of the pioneering event, an expanded workshop on this topic was held in October 2023. About 40 attendees, including engineering faculty members, students, and field practitioners participated. The two-day program of sessions comprised two international keynote speakers, moderated panels, and themed discussions, all focused toward enhancing how electricity access is taught in the classroom, how to improve the student experience in-community electricity access projects, and ways for faculty to overcome barriers in teaching electricity access. This paper will describe the second workshop in detail along with survey findings, discussion summaries, and a roadmap for further discussion.