Sustainable development goals based thinking skills development course for engineering students – a case study

Abstract

“Thinking Skills Development TSD” is a major course presented to engineering students in Port Said University. The main aim of the course is to help students understanding the core concepts of creativity and critical thinking with the help of applications in everyday life. In September 2015, the General Assembly of the United Nations embraced the 2030 agenda for sustainable development that includes 17 goals to be achieved for all. These SDGs could be considered as a global plan that should be well understood by our students. Accordingly, the main application considered as a case study in the academic year 2020/2021 is the sustainable development goals. Each student was allowed to choose a certain development goal to make a development action plan concerning the Egyptian society. The action plan depended mainly on the traditional, cognitive, critical, and creative types of thinking. The students’ action plans were classified according to the SDGs chosen. Each SDG was planned to be discussed with one of the Egyptian society experts. Discussions were held according to the students’ points of view and suggestions. In this paper, we will give a complete description of the course teaching methodology, outcomes, and students satisfaction measures. A case study of SDG 3 will be presented as a practical example of our methodology.