Development of Electronic Design Cognition during Undergraduate Electronic Engineering Education: Issues and Perspectives

Abstract

Electronic design cognition ranks among the top qualitative competencies of electronic engineers and technologists. Electronic design cognition accounts for the creative ideas and innovations that have resulted in the inventions and innovations of all scales of electronic devices and systems that have revolutionized modern society.  This study examines the factors that affect the development of electronic design cognition in undergraduates during their structured engineering education, and the nexus between curriculum design in electrical and electronic engineering technology and the development of electronic design cognition using a qualitative survey approach in a Nigerian Polytechnic setting. Findings suggest a non-adaptive and lagging-content curriculum design, misalignment to the evolution of electronic engineering education in the 21st Century, poor cultivation of electronic engineering education sub-ecosystem, and dogmatic constraints as factors that distinguished the learners in the study setting from those in other climes where electronic design cognition systematically blossoms into one of the core competencies developed through education. For a paradigm shift, a future-ready curriculum is advocated. At the same time, an improved electronic engineering education sub-ecosystem should be cultivated to target a new generation of learners (putting new wine in a new bottle), with a vigorous emphasis on enhancing and diffusing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education through sustainable educational policies and quality assurance in the procurement of learning and teaching facilities.