This seminar will preview 2013-14 academic year for the School of Engineering Education within the context of the College of Engineering’s Strategic Growth at a time of considerable change in higher education. Topics covered will include; ways we might celebrate the achievements of our first decade while also recognizing the roots of the school; envisioning our second decade; and priorities for 2013-14.

Professor Radcliffe received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in mechanical engineering from the University of Queensland, and a Ph.D. in bioengineering from Strathclyde University in Scotland.

His research focuses on the nature of engineering as a profession; how it is perceived and practiced, how it is learned especially outside the classroom, and how an engineering identity is shaped. Within this overall theme he has conducted research on the practice of engineering design thinking in a variety of industry settings, the creation and sharing of design knowledge in large and small firms with an emphasis on design for sustainability, engineering education as a complex system, the design and evaluation of learning environments, and on ways to foster distributed communities of research practice in engineering education. This research is intrinsically multidisciplinary and draws on methodologies from the humanities, social and behavioral sciences and involves collaboration with anthropologists, learning scientists, librarians, designers and architects.