R. L. ARMENTANO
dary school graduates have poor skills in mathematics and sci-
ences, worsening the uncertainty of teenagers, the weakest link
in the social chain, but nevertheless the strongest in terms of
vital energy. Let us not forget that teenagers carry the troubles
of our civilization in a very intense manner (Morin, 2011). This
negative handicap makes them refractory to study engineering
or science, thus reaching a minimum minimorum of aspirants.
Whereas in China and Japan more than two thirds of university
students choose to study Science or Engineering, in the EU
36% of students do, and in the USA, 24%. According to unof-
ficial data, in Argentina only 8% of students choose Engineer-
ing, IT, Physics or Mathematics degrees, whereas 40% is en-
rolled in Social Sciences, Psychology or Philosophy degrees. It
is said that Argentina produces five times more psychologists
than engineers (Oppenheimer, 2011). In 2010, in Uruguay, 26%
of students chose Liberal Arts related degrees, 19% of students
chose Economics or Business Administration, and only 8.2%
techno-scientific degrees. China, as well as India, is creating a
techno-scientific globalized elite, capable of competing with the
most industrialized countries. Furthermore, there is a great
amount of Asian students in universities in Europe and the
USA. In the meantime, the number of South American students,
studying locally or abroad, is at a standstill or decreasing. It is
noteworthy that this reality occurs as all of the achievements of
the 20th century change our habitat. So many complex accom-
plishments have subliminally become a part of our daily lives,
that engineering and—above all—engineering research are taken
for granted and go unnoticed, although without them, we be-
lieve, the world would be less accessible, poorer and, above all,
less interesting.
Focus on Innovation
What do we understand by Engineering Research? It is sim-
ply the motor of innovation. In a global economy driven by
knowledge, technological innovation—the transformation of
knowledge into products, processes and services—is essential
for competitiveness, for long-term growth of productivity and
for wealth creation. The pre-eminence in technological innova-
tion requires leadership in all aspects of engineering: research
as a bridge between scientific discoveries and practical applica-
tions, the teaching of skills needed to create and exploit
knowledge and technological innovation, and the practice of
engineering to translate knowledge into innovation, competitive
products and services. By combining research with education,
we not only seize the creativity of the young, but also their
training in analytical thinking and in research methodologies,
and their solid knowledge of science and engineering, thus
tacitly generating brilliant young teacher researchers. This is
how we face the great threat of engineering: the aging of the
faculty members’ concomitant with the obsolescence of the
infrastructure. Engineering professors are rapidly aging, and
together with other factors such as the slim financial support of
the last years, the absence of long term commitments, the lack
of interdisciplinary research and curricular innovation, the vi-
cious circle that sets apart young people from engineering
schools strengthens. On the other hand, with the collaboration
of the industries and laboratories, universities can gather ex-
perts in several disciplines, in order to investigate and satisfy
the needs of a certain product or service with a high added
value. At the same time, university students can develop their
scientific thinking and simultaneously gain comprehension
about the forces of the markets through internships and in-
volvement in research projects, development and innovation.
The academia-industry interaction, as well as the support of
governmental agencies, can create enough resources for engi-
neering universities to be able to modernize their facilities, and
by this, making the specialty much more attractive to the new
generations, and to engage students to complete their degrees.
The installation of laboratories with state-of-the-art technology
can enhance the quality of engineering education to a great
extent, and create opportunities for thousands of young creative
people to contribute to the innovation process. The increase in
funding for research in engineering would also create opportu-
nities of attracting talented citizens from all over our countries,
as well as talented students from all over the world, to join our
doctorate programs. The innovation we foresee and wish to
promote across our countries will undoubtedly require of the
alumni, who possess solid bases to design and create products
with an important added value, in order to satisfy demands and
exceed the expectations in this era, where technology evolves
very fast. This is because they posses skills to develop them-
selves in domains that may have not existed at the time they
completed their degrees, and to face a context of global crisis,
but nevertheless of great opportunities.
Focus on Creativity
We are convinced that many findings in the field of Engi-
neering and Science in general, which have had great impact in
humanity, are the result of serendipity, i.e. the receptive ability
to discover, unexpectedly, something valuable. Creativity awak-
ens the power of our numbed imagination; it is boldness, ad-
venture, discovering and learning from change. Creativity may
seem to be magic, a supernatural power, denied to many mor-
tals and granted to a few, for them to imagine what has never
existed before. But creativity is not magical; it is not a genetic
attribute or a blessing of the angels, it is ability! Anyone can
learn to be creative and to benefit the most from it. The science
of creativity is a relatively new concept. Years ago, imagination
was compared to a superior act. To be creative meant to have a
direct link with the muses. Even in this modern era, scientists
have paid little attention to the sources of creativity; however,
during the last decade, it has started to change. Nowadays, the
word creativity is used as a generic term to name several cogni-
tive tools, each applying to certain issues, conditioning the
action in a particular way. New researches also suggest that
creative thinking is the best way of approaching the most diffi-
cult problems. We tend to assume that experts are creative gen-
iuses in their fields. However, the great advances often depend
on the naïve audacity of the profane. To provoke creativity, few
things are as important as the time that is dedicated to the
cross-pollination with other fields. Many countries are revising
the programs of scientific education and the application of new
pedagogic paradigms that tend to revert the downward trend of
enrollments. A key factor of this trend is the public perception
that science does not involve a creative effort. The attempts of
reformulating the public perception tend to center themselves in
the primary and secondary education, but they do little to face
the continuous drop in quality and originality of the intellectual
production further than secondary school (Schmidt, 2011). The
overcoming of the systematic devaluation of science requires
valuing the complex, dynamic and stochastic interaction of the
sociocultural, psychological and cognitive factors that drive
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