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This paper describes the design and implementation of a tool for experimenting with mobile robotics concepts, primarily for use by children and teenagers, or by the general public, without previous experience in robotics. This tool helps children learn about science in an approachable and interactive way, using scientific research principles in captivating activities that help the child develop problem-solving skills within his group. This initiative seeks to spark interest in scientific and engineering careers as a response to diminished enrollment in such courses by young students. The application of this tool was tested on groups of people ranging from schoolchildren to college students with diverse backgrounds and varying levels of robotics experience and knowledge. The following performance parameters were measured: time to build the robotic platform, time to finalize challenges, and the percentage of challenges successfully accomplished. (Contains 4 tables and 10 figures.)

Copyright of Revista CS is the property of Rafael Silva Vega and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Multidisciplinary teams often undertake engineering projects beyond their original discipline involving different kinds of risks. Risk perception is an inherent and embedded part of the decision-making process, which depends on the personal background and instinctive attitudes or behaviors. Process safety and risk analysis training for engineers, and education for engineering students, provide valuable tools seeking safer workplaces; however, personnel's risk perception is commonly neglected. This paper analyzes the risk perception and appetite of undergraduate engineering students in Colombia based on a survey strategy and a weighted-approach following a Factor Analysis. The survey considered financial, social, physical, and professional risks, and four main reasons for risk-taking or risk-avoiding actions. The Factor Analysis allows us to classify the students tendency as risk-averse o risk-prone, and propose didactic teaching planning using a modular toolbox for process safety education, based on skills identified for junior engineers in Colombian Oil & Gas Industry. A total of 465 engineering students from 12 Colombian universities completed the survey in 2016. The results suggest that risk perception depends on the location, possible risk training, and accessible information. The obtained factors allow describing the students' overall risk profiles, which can serve as an input for refining the content and curriculum content of current engineering programs regarding process safety. Improving the training of risk management in the engineering curriculum will benefit upcoming multidisciplinary teams in high-risk industries. • Risk perception and appetite of engineering undergraduate students was evaluated. • A survey strategy and a weighted-approach using a Factor Analysis were considered. • The survey contemplated professional, financial, physical and social risks. • It considers preventive, adventurous, inspirational, or rewarding risk reasons. • Factor Analysis allow classifying each student as risk-averse or risk-prone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Ingeniería y Competitividad is the property of Universidad del Valle and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Diversitas (17949998) is the property of Universidad Santo Tomas, Facultad de Psicologia and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper examines the role of engineering in the solution of problems related with the regulation and sustenance possibilities of water resources in the medium and long term. It also talks about the curricular needs in order to generate more qualified engineers by the academy. Indeed, in the era of the competitiveness, the questions that arise for the academy are: What are the competences in the undergraduate programs that make suitable engineers to contribute in the water resources theme?, how many elements do the engineering undergraduate and post grades programs have for carrying out water resources regulation and sustenance processes?. In order to answer these questions, basic subjects about the water resources in Colombia are shown at the begining of this paper; right after that encounters among similar engineering programs are established to contribute to the regulation and sustenance of the water resources. And finally the new world-wide concepts that are applied in water resources studies are approached. To contribute to the regulation and sustenance of water resources from the academy, higher education must be seen as a part of the cultural bases of a country, so it will contribute to the patrimony of its population as well as in politics, development management and the social integrity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focusing on Colombian engineer Miguel Triana's 1907 travelogue Por el sur de Colombia, this article discusses the role that labour, broadly understood, plays in the projects of state transformation of the Putumayo region, in the Colombian Amazon. The text analyses the role that physical effort plays in making possible the construction of infrastructural works such as roads in the Amazon space, but also in the concrete forms of land cultivation he observes in Indigenous peoples and in his own process of writing his travelogue. Theories of environmental determinism turn out to be key in Triana's understanding of labour as a way of transforming nature and bringing progress to the Colombian frontiers. The article makes clear the rhetorical process through which different forms of materiality – roads, bridges, books, cultivation – are seen as parallel forms of embodiment in the discourse of engineering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Trilogía is the property of Revista Trilogia, Ciencia, Tecnologia y Sociedad and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista EIA is the property of Escuela de Ingenieria de Antioquia and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

To achieve effective intervention of engineers in the public sector, engineers should develop skills to comprehend their ethical and professional responsibility, and they should gain the necessary education to understand the possible impact of engineering solutions in a global and social context. An active learning process has been conceived, which enables engineering students of Universidad de los Andes to comprehend the scope and limitations of public management, in general, with the objective of solving public problems. The method used to set the objective in motion comprises a workshop where students simulate a democratic republic with a parliamentary system. The simulation works as a pretext for students to compare their experience with some of the problems of Colombian public management. In this article, we will submit the evolution of the different processes that take place and that enable the optimization of resources in the republic, thus generating knowledge about public systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]