2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

In this WIP paper, the author describes an attempt to incorporate a sociotechnical lens of analysis into a sophomore-level course called “Civil Engineering Materials.” This course, which is required for all civil engineering majors, is the study of the properties and uses of materials, such as steel, concrete, asphalt, and others, that are widely used in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry. The primary sociotechnical interventions in this course will be 1) life cycle assessments (LCAs) and 2) written reflection assignments.

For the LCAs, students will be asked to quantify the impacts of the covered materials according to conventional metrics, such as carbon footprint. For the written reflection assignments, students will be asked to comment on materials’ properties and effects related to their production and use from the perspectives of different parties that work in and are affected by the AEC industry. Such parties will include trades workers, factory workers, end users, members of the public at-large, and practicing engineers. Students will be encouraged to use a variety of sources, including interviews, if possible, to inform their reflections, and to consider the connections between and contradictions raised by their LCAs and reflections.

These assignments by themselves do not necessarily represent “sociotechnical interventions.” The author’s intent is to promote sociotechnical integration by presenting the two tools—LCA and written reflection—as frameworks, rather than rote processes, through which to understand civil engineering materials. In other words, students will be asked not simply to memorize physical properties, but to use examination of a particular material to explore how the AEC industry and the people it comprises “work.”

While more explicit attempts to dismantle engineering’s “culture of disengagement” deserve recognition as essential to engineering education, there is, as others have noted, strategic value in targeting for sociotechnical intervention content that is already widely recognized as “real” engineering. This course and these interventions would be recognized as such for three reasons: 1) the course itself is required for all civil engineering majors at the author’s institution, 2) LCAs are established tools in industry that require the “hard” skill of quantitative analysis, and 3) communication with “diverse stakeholders” in the AEC industry is understood as an important part of professional development.

This work is in part inspired by Gary Downey’s examination of how to position engineers as not only problem solvers, but also problem definers who listen. With this in mind, the author will present and analyze survey results and feedback from student reviews to assess whether the interventions have an impact on 1) students’ ability to understand engineers’ role within larger constructs and processes, such as the AEC industry or infrastructure development, and 2) students’ ability to understand or empathize with other actors in those constructs and processes. The author would like to build on this initial effort at formal sociotechnical integration in the curriculum and hopes that the WIP format will provide the opportunity for refinement of both the interventions and the means of assessing their impact.