2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Significant numbers of first-year community college students place below Calculus-level mathematics and face extended prerequisite sequences before engaging with core engineering content. This NSF IUSE: Innovation in Two-Year College STEM Education (ITYC) project addresses this challenge through a two-quarter learning community that integrates engineering, mathematics, history, and English composition. The Engineering in Context Learning Community employs place-based learning, community-engaged projects, hands-on mathematics labs, and course-based undergraduate research to support precalculus-level students entering our engineering transfer program while explicitly foregrounding the social dimensions of engineering practice throughout the curriculum.

Rather than treating social context as supplementary content, the learning community curriculum positions engineers as inherently working within social, cultural, and political systems. In the first quarter, the Historical Marker Project engages students in original archival research examining 150 years of engineered shoreline development in their region. Students analyze how engineering decisions shaped land use, environmental change and community well-being while developing historical research skills and creating multimedia presentations that integrate engineering analysis with social impact. The second quarter Problem Exploration Project asks students to investigate societal problems with plausible engineering dimensions—students have explored topics like ocean acidification, housing affordability, public transit, and declining bee populations—with explicit instructions to explore social and technical aspects without prioritizing either or proposing solutions. Throughout both quarters, structured discussions engage students with concepts like sociotechnical dualism, algorithmic bias, and the political dimensions of engineering work.

Student feedback and analysis of culminating reflective writing assignments from the first three cohorts (2023-24, 2024-25, 2025-26) reveals that this sustained engagement with social context triggers what we characterize as ethical awakening. Students develop strong moral commitments, articulating values like "benefit others" and asking critical questions like "who are you leaving out?" Simultaneously, they recognize barriers to enacting these values within traditional engineering career pathways. Rather than resolving this tension, the curriculum creates space for students to hold and grapple with it. Student feedback consistently emphasizes appreciation for interdisciplinary connections, with students noting surprise that history and English courses "paired well" with engineering and made content "relevant to what I was interested in."

This work demonstrates approaches for integrating social awareness throughout technical foundations rather than relegating it to ethics modules or capstone experiences, potentially supporting development of engineering identity that encompasses both technical competence and social responsibility.