Joint International IGIP-SEFI Annual Conference 2010, 19 th - 22 nd September 2010, Trnava, Slovakia DIVERSITY OF DIDACTICAL APPROACHES TO FOSTER DIVERSITY OF ENGINEERS Susanne Ihsen 1 , Brent K. Jesiek 2 , Gudrun Kammasch 3 , Kacey Beddoes 4 1 Technische Universität München, Arcisstr. 21, 80290 München ihsen@tum.de 2 School of Engineering Education, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA bjesiek@purdue.edu 3 Beuth Hochschule für Technik, Luxemburger Str. 10, 13353 Berlin kammasch@beuth-hochschule.de 4 Science and Technology Studies, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA kbeddoes@vt.edu Abstract: Europe and USA have a specific focus on high technology and engineering services. In this case both accept the diversity argument; research and industry need to create teams made up of members of different backgrounds, ages and sexes to come close to future issues and today’s markets. This means a strong link to engineering education and a continuous change of experiences in engineering education research. This is the issue of the workshop which invites the participants along with three keynotes to think about new perspectives of diversity in engineering education. The results of all research run in the last 20 years may be focused on the question: which were successful in integrating the different gender and diversity background of students to foster engineers? Keywords: gender, diversity, quality, didactical approaches 1. Gender Diversity in Engineering and Science: State of the Art in Europe (Susanne Ihsen) Introduction The first European Conference on Gender and Diversity in Engineering and Science 2009, run by VDI, the Association of German Engineers, and scientifically accompanied by TU München, aimed to sum up the research and give an overview about the development and innovations in this topic [1]. With this aim in view, there were presentations of research and best practices all over Europe and internationally, and the results of studies showed the benefits of diversity and gender conscious management, and information on worldwide work-life balance concepts in sciences and engineering. Also, in 2009, a special issue on Diversity in Engineering Education of the European Journal of Engineering Education (EJEE) was published [2]. So we got a deeply view on the state of the art which will be summarized and classified, e.g. Changing the Engineering Profession and its Relevance in Engineering Education Literature review