2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Employing the Zettelkasten Note-taking Method to Foster Socio-Technical Thinking in Engineering Educational Spaces

Presented at Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 6

Engineering infrastructure has impacts which extend beyond the technical aspects of design, calling for engineers to have the ability to understand the broader societal, economic, and environmental impacts of their work. This awareness of social and environmental factors amidst the technical design process is often referred to as socio-technical thinking (STT). When STT is treated as a learnable trait, it becomes an area of focus within the engineering classroom. Growing out of dialogue surrounding experiential learning as a pedagogy for engaging engineering students with STT, this research explores how critical pedagogy can be used to make in-class experiential activities more meaningful and transformative for students. We present the Zettelkasten (ZK) note-taking method as this critical pedagogy, integrating it alongside experiential activities among both an in-depth summer research group and undergraduate engineering course. Student responses to the activity as well as their reflections serve as the basis of our results, which indicate that STT and a variety of other meaningful outcomes were fostered throughout. By outlining this case, we provide a useful resource and pedagogy for educators to foster and integrate meaningful engagement with STT among their engineering students.

Authors

Mr. Connor LaSalle University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

Connor LaSalle recently graduated with his Masters degree from the Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. As a member of the Contextual Engineering Research Group (CERG), his work lies at the intersection of engineering and social science. Through education and participatory research, he seeks to integrate both community members and engineering consultants into the conversation of infrastructure design and engineering practice.
Dr. Emily Lawson-Bulten Duquesne University [biography]

Emily Lawson-Bulten is a recent doctoral graduate from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. As a licensed civil engineer, she is concerned about equitable access to infrastructure, especially for WASH services in non-industrialized nations. Her research focuses on the influence of power dynamics between international NGOs, engineers, and their client communities on water system design. With a background in Contextual Engineering and International Development Studies, Emily utilizes participatory approaches to increase engineering awareness and community agency throughout the design process. As an educator, Emily integrates feminist and decolonial methodologies into the classroom for sociotechnical understanding.
Dr. Ann-Perry Witmer P.E. http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7210-9572 University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign [biography]

A teaching professor, researcher, lecturer, and professional civil engineer, Ann-Perry Witmer is the architect of the emerging discipline of Contextual Engineering, which merges technical design with societal understanding to improve adoption outcomes.
Bethany Reed University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign

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