Teaching Ethics and Sustainability to Informatics Engineering Students, An Almost 30 Years’ Experience

Maria Jose Casañ, Marc Alier and Ariadna Llorens
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Maria Jose Casañ: Barcelona School of Informatics, Univestitat Politècnica de Catalunya, 08034 Barcelona, Spain
Marc Alier: Barcelona School of Informatics, Univestitat Politècnica de Catalunya, 08034 Barcelona, Spain
Ariadna Llorens: Escola Politècnica Superior d’Enginyeria de Vilanova i la Geltrú, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, 08800 Vilanova i la Geltrú, Spain

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 14, 1-14

Abstract: A significant number of universities where engineering is taught, acknowledge the importance of the social and environmental impact of the scientific and technological practice, as well as the ethical problems it presents, and the need to provide their students with courses covering this as a subject. This paper presents 29 years of teaching courses with the subject of social, environmental, and ethical issues to students of Informatics Engineering. The table contents and its evolution over the years will be analyzed, plus the different teaching strategies applied, with emphasis on the collaborative learning methodologies to facilitate critical thinking and debate. During the experience, the course incorporated the subject of History of Informatics which proved to fit in the course. While the subject of Ethics and Sustainability is increasingly being regarded as an important matter to learn by future ICT engineers, the courses covering it remain as optional in the curriculums. This should change.

Keywords: teaching; computer ethics; environmental issues; social issues; computer science (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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