The Rationale for Developing Global Competence

This paper addresses three questions related to the rationale for global engineering education. These questions are, Why do engineering students need to have a new set of skills, which we will collectively refer to as “global competence?” What does it mean for students to have global competence? and, What are the most important attributes of global competence? In answer to the first question, we discuss the forces and events of the past 20 years which have driven the globalization of engineering. In answer to the second question, we present 13 dimensions of global competence. To answer the third question, we present survey results from engineering educators and leaders in industry regarding the relative importance of these dimensions. We then discuss some implications of the answers to these questions