Ann-Kristin Winkens

• Doctor of Engineering
• PostDoc at RWTH Aachen University

Engineering graduates have to cope with dynamic and complex changes and ongoing challenges that directly affect society, for which they are jointly responsible. Accordingly, engineering education requires competencies that enable future engineers to create adaptive systems that are capable of dealing with crises and sudden disruptions. These abilit...

Future engineering professionals have to deal with increasing complexity and uncertainty, as global challenges, such as climate change, globalisation and digitalisation, require creative, innovative solutions and interdisciplinary perspectives. Accordingly, engineering graduates have to be prepared to deal with those kinds of problems at different...

Climate change increases the risk of natural disasters, which requires the design of sustainable and resilient infrastructure. This implies a need to enable engineering students to deal with highly complex problems and uncertainty. These competencies refer to the concept of resilience, describing the ability of a system to adapt to threatening even...

As future system designers and decision-makers, engineering students should be trained to anticipate and navigate the unknown. These days, engineers often operate in professional, social and societal environments characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (VUCA). Therefore, besides traditional engineering skills, educational...

In view of the increasing intensity and frequency of natural disasters due to climate change, engineers need to be able to design systems and infrastructures that are resilient to disruptions. Resilience, here, describes the ability of systems to not only be prepared for sudden crises and to recover from these, but also to learn in order to build a...

Research highlights the influence of faculty on educational change in engineering education, emphasizing the need for interdisciplinary research and strategies aligned with individual perspectives. This study investigates the role of motivational and hindering factors among faculty engaged in engineering education across different European universi...

Facing global challenges, as formulated in the UN Sustainable Development Goals, requires engineering efforts. For this purpose, it is crucial to reflect on the role and responsibilities of engineers for society and environment. Here, engineering education's central contribution must be to educate competent engineering professionals. However, educa...

Global challenges such as climate change lead to increasing volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity that pose numerous challenges for socio-technical systems. Engineers are jointly responsible for the design of these systems. Thus, engineering students need to be enabled to build and design complex systems that adapt to sudden disturbance...

A rapidly changing world with a high degree of uncertainty in the context of climate change requires sustainable and resilient infrastructures, for which engineers are jointly responsible. For this purpose, engineering students need to acquire competencies such as dealing with complexity and uncertainty, systems thinking and anticipatory thinking,...

Training in scientific integrity continues to be an important topic in universities and other research institutions. Its main goal is to prevent scientific misconduct and promote good scientific practice. However, there is still no consensus on how scientific integrity should be taught. Moreover, the perspective of those who receive such training i...

Engineering and technology-based solutions can address the global challenges associated with sustainable development. In this context, engineers have a substantial responsibility in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Meeting the challenges of all SDGs influences economic, political and social aspects of human life. However, enginee...

There are numerous discourses about competencies of future engineers as well as the challenge to learn, teach and assess them. In particular, this applies for the question of which competencies – besides technical knowledge and understanding – are relevant for future engineers in order to responsibly address the needs of society. This paper contain...

One of the main responsibilities of universities for their students, researchers, and society is to teach scientific integrity. Over the years, many universities—including RWTH Aachen University—have developed modules to impart the rules of good scientific practice. The current case study outlines the “Scientific Integrity” online course of RWTH Aa...

The increasing relevance of uncertainty and complexity provides ongoing and future challenges for engineers. Subsequently, engineers require competencies such as systems thinking, judgement and decision-making in the face of uncertainty or complex problem solving as part of their education. Already, these are part of e.g. the ABET and EUR-ACE stand...

In this workshop run by the Engineering skills SIG, attendees were given the opportunity to learn about emerging professional competencies, and strategies to overcome teaching barriers.The workshop format was “world cafe” with several tables for small groups to informally discuss these strategies within a time limit. Each table focussed on an emerg...

Introducing engineering students to topics of social responsibility and sustainability in the field of science and technology studies is internationally discussed, but there is little common consensus on best practices. Especially in large and mandatory engineering courses, initiating reflection processes among the students imposes difficulties on...

The master’s seminar ‘‘Competencies for Social and Sustainable Engineering Design’’ at RWTH Aachen University is part of the study programs Environmental Engineering, Civil Engineering and Industrial Engineering. Focusing on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), this course covers, teaches and reflects relevant competencies for socially resp...

For coping with global challenges based on best available knowledge, the interdisciplinary training of scientists is seen as a key feature of academic education. Scientists educated this way – t-shaped scientists – are seen as being better prepared to facilitate problem-solving processes by combining different disciplinary views on the strong funda...

Initiating a reflection process in large engineering classes is a frequently discussed challenge regarding competence-based teaching and learning. Especially in Germany, engineering education continues to be heavily dominated by technical content, which, combined with the large number of compulsory courses, poses challenges in terms of reflection e...