Ferrol, 28th of February 2024. To contribute to the development of the creative skills of the students of university engineering degrees and to promote among these young people other key skills such as problem solving or critical thinking. This is the main objective of the European project Erasmus+. Creative Engineering (CEDE) in which teaching staff linked to non-central campuses of the Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra (Slovakia), the Kocatürk Danismanlik in Adana (Turkey), the Università degli Studi del Molise in Campobasso (Italy), the University of Diethnes Panepistimio Ellados in Thermi participate (Greece) and the University of A Coruña (Spain).
Ana Ares, lecturer at the Industrial Campus of Ferrol, is in charge of coordinating this European teaching innovation project at the University of A Coruña. Together with her, 10 other teachers linked to the University School of Industrial Design (EUDI) and the Polytechnic School of Enxeñaría de Ferrol (EPEF) are collaborating in this initiative. Its first task was to draw up a comparative report examining the treatment of creativity, both in the faculties and engineering schools of the universities involved in the project, as well as in other universities in the participating countries. That working document highlights the centers where they already include creative skills and those where it would be “relatively easy” to incorporate a common creative module in the initial stages.
Drawing on the experience acquired over all these years and based on examples of good practice carried out at the Ferrol Industrial Campus, the team, led by Ana Ares, lecturer at the University of A Coruña, designed the content, methodology and evaluation method for the section on “Design Thinking” of a possible training module common to all the curricula of engineering degrees in Europe. The model developed at the University School of Industrial Design (EUDI), where students develop projects with companies linked to subjects from the first courses, was taken into consideration for the elaboration of this part of the module. The work methodology implemented at the Polytechnic School of Engineering of Ferrol (EPEF), in which students are “totally” involved in interdisciplinary projects, such as the development of components for autonomous or electric vehicles was also mentioned.
Currently, the teaching staff of the Industrial Campus of Ferrol involved in the European project Erasmus+ Creative Engineering (CEDE) is working on the design of an e-learning platform aimed at students of engineering degrees throughout Europe with the aim of improving their creative skills. The next working meeting will take place in Greece in July. Previously, other conferences were held in Slovakia, Italy and Turkey. The city of Ferrol will host the last of these meetings in March 2025.
The European project Erasmus+ Creative Engineering (CEDE) is financed by the European Union and has a total budget of 250,000 euros. The University of A Coruña has 48,544 euros to draw up a preliminary report, to design a training module to be incorporated into the study plans of the different engineering degrees throughout Europe and to create an e-learning platform to improve the creative abilities of these students.
