Raising the interest of students in engineering with an integrated summer programme

In this paper, we describe how a two year summer programme is conducted for high-school students to stimulate their interest in engineering and allow them to understand how engineering can improve people's living standards and contribute to society. In this programme, thirty-four students participated in a series of activities including lectures visits to plants, a guided hands-on project, and a four-day voluntary service trip to P. R. China, applying their engineering knowledge. The objective of the programme is to expose high-school students to engineering at an appropriate level. The voluntary service trip can help to instil a sense of compassion in high-school students. In the presentation and reports submitted, most of the students stated that they found the programme meaningful, it can enhance their knowledge of engineering, that they could apply the engineering skills to real-life applications to improve the living standard of people and that and they would like to consider choosing the field of engineering as their future career option in order to contribute to society based on their interest. According to the survey, the integrated summer programme can raise the students' interest in engineering. © 2012 TEMPUS Publications.