HPS282S - HISTORY OF TECHNOLOGY AND ENGINEERING
Spring 1998
Engineering Education in England and North America
3 February 1998
I. The English Model of Engineering Education
A. General Conditions
B. Engineering Education in the 19c
1. Most engineering is picked up by apprenticeship and on the job experience
2. Theoretical education picked up by individual initiative or, less frequently, taking university courses.
C. Other Technical Education in England
1. The Mechanics' Institutes
a) The Ideological Debate
b) First Institutes
c) Popularization and Transformation of the Movement
d) In Canada and the US
II. West Point vs. the Erie Canal
A. West Point and French influence 1802
1. Curriculum and Pedagogy, but not recruitment modeled on Ecole Polytechnique
2. Attitudes of American Military Engineers to Technology and Knowledge
a) Formal training along lines of Polytechnique
b) Scientific methods
c) Build for the ages, with little attention to economic considerations
d) National and military objectives should be paramount, not local objectives or those of clients
3. Other Engineering Education before the Civil War
a) Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute 1824
b) Engineering in the Universities
B. The Erie Canal and the tradition of apprenticeship
1. The building of the canal 1817-1825
2. Creation of a pool of technical skills
3. Contrast with West Point Engineers
a) Instruction by apprenticeship
b) Most economic rather than technically the best solutions sought
c) Interests of client put foremost
III. The Rise of Academic Engineering Education in the English-speaking World
A. The Morrill Land Grant Act 1862
B. The Growth of Technical Universities and Technical Faculties
IV. Early Canadian Engineering Education [From 284/95]
A. First Engineering Courses UNB 1854
B. Attempt to establish engineering courses at McGill and UofT around same time
C. School of Practical Science ("Skule") established in 1873
1. SPS becomes Faculty of Applied Sciences and Engineering in 1906 (Galbraith the first Dean)
