A course in Dalhousie’s College of Engineering is reshaping how college students perceive their function as engineers, providing a uncommon alternative to mix studying via Indigenous information programs with utilized engineering observe.
Indigenous Views in Engineering, developed in collaboration with the Ulnooweg Training Centre and an advisory council of Indigenous companions and group members, helps college students in understanding each the historical past and obligations of working with Indigenous communities and lands.
“The course has actually been designed to take a look at engineering via a non-western worldview,” says teacher Levi Morrison (BEng’13), a Dal civil engineering alum, who leads the course collectively with Christopher Googoo, chief working officer with Ulnooweg. “It introduces Indigenous information programs, governance buildings, and what true partnership seems to be like alongside engineering observe.”
Neighborhood-centred studying
The course — provided for the primary time this previous winter — combines lectures, case research, and collaborative discussions designed to encourage college students to assume critically concerning the broader impacts of engineering work.
Slightly than counting on conventional textbooks, the course centres round Indigenous-authored texts and lived experiences. Lots of the case research give attention to initiatives which have taken place in Mi’kma’ki and Wolastoqiyik territory, whereas additionally increasing to broader examples throughout Turtle Island (also called North America).
Chris and I labored to make sure Indigenous leaders of their fields delivered content material all through the course.
“Chris and I labored to make sure Indigenous leaders of their fields delivered content material all through the course,” says Morrison. “We additionally included speaking circles to help reflection and dialogue centred on texts produced by Indigenous authors.”
Via these discussions, college students had been inspired to grasp that engineering exists throughout many information programs, together with Indigenous methods of understanding, and carries obligations that reach past technical design to relationships with land and group.
“This work is about understanding that Indigenous information frameworks are rooted in relationships with the land, and the way these relationships inform engineering observe,” Morrison explains. “It additionally asks college students to think about the obligations engineers carry in relation to treaties, the responsibility to seek the advice of, and significant engagement, and to mirror on how completely different worldviews form their strategy to the work.”
“All the course content material was co-created with information holders, Indigenous educators, and the Ulnooweg Training Centre,” provides Googoo.
Creating pathways
The course was launched as a part of the College of Engineering’s Inclusive Pathways to Engineering Careers Program, launched in 2023. In partnership with Ulnooweg, the College established an Indigenous stream inside the program to help Indigenous college students via tutorial preparation, mentorship, cultural programming, and profession steering. A devoted Indigenous scholar centre opened on Sexton Campus final fall to help this work.
Ulnooweg has performed a key function in shaping this work at Dal, serving to information each the event of the course and the broader partnership mannequin behind it.
“It’s been enlightening to work with them via this course of,” says Googoo of Dal. “Their openness to not simply stroll alongside us, however to step again and permit Indigenous management to information this work has been significant.”
Shifting forward
Googoo says the influence of the course is already being felt inside Indigenous communities, which confirmed sturdy scholar curiosity within the Indigenous Views in Engineering course. Morrison provides that many non-Indigenous college students additionally signed up. With 30 spots initially obtainable, enrolment was elevated to 35 as demand for the course grew.
Whereas the course wrapped up in early April, the co-leads say planning is already underway for subsequent yr, together with discussions round enrolment, timing inside the engineering curriculum, and the way the construction could evolve to mirror the wants of the scholars and the way communities can take part.
I hope college students go away with a deeper understanding of what’s potential when relationships are constructed with care and respect.
For Googoo, one of the vital objectives can also be who the course reaches, in addition to how college students carry that studying ahead.
“I hope college students go away with a deeper understanding of what’s potential when relationships are constructed with care and respect,” he says. “And that they carry that ahead, not simply of their work, however in how they have interaction with Indigenous communities.”
