Creativity development in undergraduate Engineering courses at the University of Malta

Abstract

The evolving challenges for engineers prompt a debate on the approach to engineering practice. Engineers must expand their aptitudes to address the complexities of the hybrid world. The 'new-century engineer' needs a diverse skillset and it falls within the remits of higher education entities to craft graduate engineers wielding such skillset. One of these skills that is reportedly desired in industry and yet is increasingly scarce in engineers is creativity. This study focuses on the exploration of the University of Malta in terms of providing its undergraduate engineering students with a creative experience complementing their creative development. The Five A’s framework is employed to delineate the actors, actions, artefacts, audiences and affordances framing this study. This study was informed by primary and secondary data. The secondary data comprised of the programme of studies of all of the undergraduate engineering courses which was utilised for a conceptual content analysis. A total of 13 semi-structured interviews held with academics, students and industrial employers populated the primary data. Thematic analysis served to generate eight themes. The findings revealed that creativity in engineering is widely associated with problem-solving and that open-ended projects based on real-world problems denote the most apparent opportunities for creativity to flourish. Barriers and facilitators of creative development are discussed together with other affordances. Findings denote that creative development coactively complements and supports the development of other 21st century skills like critical thinking and complex problem solving. Recommendations for future research and for practice are discussed once critical reflections on the limitations of this study are presented.