Environmental Sustainability and Engineering
Published in September 2022, this briefing looks the opinions of young people, their parents and teachers using data from the Engineering Brand Monitor. We explore opinions on the link between environmental sustainability and engineering, and show that this correlates with interest in engineering as a future career for young people. We were able to link responses of young people with their parents and found a strong correlation between them. Overall, the majority of teachers understood the important role engineers will play in improving environmental sustainability, with no differences by school-type or personal characteristics.
Key findings:
- 70% of young people said ‘engineers are important for improving the environment’
- 17% of young people selected ‘improving environmental sustainability’ as an important factor in their future career choice – only 6% chose it in their top 3
- Young people who selected this [‘improving environmental sustainability’] were 3 times more likely to be interested in a career that involves engineering than those who did not
- 91% of young people who had an interest in improving environmental sustainability AND said that engineers were important for improving the environment were interested in an engineering career. Only 39% who did not think so had an interest in an engineering career.
- Young people who agreed that ‘engineers are important for improving the environment’ were almost 7 times more likely to be interested in a career that involves engineering than those who did not agree.
- 82% of parents agreed that ‘engineers are important for improving environmental sustainability’. Parents with a lower household income were less likely to agree.
- There is strong parental influence: 77% of young people whose parents agreed that ‘engineers are important for improving environmental sustainability’ also agreeing, compared with 49% of young people whose parents did not agree.
- 95% of teachers agreed that ‘engineers are important for improving environmental sustainability’, with higher agreement among those who had been teaching for more than 10 years.