Analyzing Sustainability Awareness and Professional Ethics of Civil Engineering Bachelor’s Degree Students

Patricia Mares-Nasarre (), Víctor Martínez-Ibáñez and Amalia Sanz-Benlloch
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Patricia Mares-Nasarre: Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, 2628 CD Delft, The Netherlands
Víctor Martínez-Ibáñez: Department of Geotechnical and Geological Engineering, Universitat Politècnica de València, 46022 Valencia, Spain
Amalia Sanz-Benlloch: Construction Project Management Research Group, Universitat Politècnica de València, 46022 Valencia, Spain

Sustainability, 2023, vol. 15, issue 7, 1-16

Abstract: Teaching sustainability and ethics to engineering students is a challenging but necessary task that has been increasingly investigated during the last few years. In this research, a systematic method to identify the level of awareness in students about sustainability and ethics is developed. Here, it is applied to students studying the Civil Engineering bachelor’s degree at the School of Civil Engineering of Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV), though this method is potentially applicable to equivalent ABET and EUR-ACE accredited bachelor’s degrees. A survey was performed, and data was analyzed using Analytical hierarchical process technique; this technique determines the relative importance of each criterion, as well as the consistency of the emitted judgements, in an objective manner. These results allowed to discover that students do not have a robust opinion related to sustainability and ethics, except those students with previous experience in the construction sector. Environmental and social dimensions of sustainability and ethics were identified as the main focuses to emphasize in the civil engineering curriculum. Finally, actions to boot these principles are also proposed; potential courses where sustainability and ethics concepts could be explicitly included were selected and the inclusion of an environmental budget in the bachelor thesis was recommended, among others suggestions.

Keywords: education; sustainability; professional ethics; civil engineering; sustainable development goals; professional skills (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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