World Federation of Engineering Organisations (WFEO) World Engineering Convention 2019 Melbourne

“ Putting A Human Face on Engineering”

By Academician Dato Ir, (Dr) Lee Yee Cheong AO, President, Academy of Engineering and Technology of the Developing World(AETDEW)/Commissioner, UN Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development/Honorary Chair, UNESCO International Science Technology Innovation Centre for South-South Cooperaion/Past President, World Federation of Engineering Organisations

On 3 September 2019, ISTIC’s Biennial “Return Home to UNESCO” Forum

was themed “Responding to the Unique Challenges of Climate Change

through Climate Education”.

One Conclusion: “To engage children and youth through climate education

needs time, but time is running out for the world!”

Another Unexpected Conclusion: “UNESCO must lead the world in solving

the pressing problem of declining enrolment in STEM stream in schools

throughout the world”.

As an lifelong advocate of STEM education through Inquiry Based Science

Education (IBSE), the unexpected conclusion provides me with much food

for thought. IBSE is the learning methodology that stimulates the inborn

curiosity of children rather than stifling it by rote and book learning.

In thinking afresh how to interest children and youth in STEM and Engineering I feel we must reassess the need for STEM human resources in accordance to the Digital Revolution that underpins the current 4th

Industrial Revolution.

Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World EconomicForum, in proclaiming the coming of the 4th Industrial Revolution in Davos

January 2016 thus:

“The possibilities of billions of people connected by mobile devices, with

unprecedented processing power, storage capacity, and access to knowledge,

are unlimited. These possibilities will be multiplied by emerging technology

breakthroughs in fields such as artificial intelligence, robotics, the Internet of

Things, autonomous vehicles, 3-D printing, nanotechnology, biotechnology,

materials science, energy storage, and quantum computing.”

He characterized the 4th Industrial Revolution as Most Disruptive of Human

Society. One Immediate Global Impact is Massive Job Loss.

In Davos 2016, World Economic Forum also released its study report “The

Future of Jobs” http://reports.weforum.org/future-of-jobs-2016/ The study

covered more than 13 million employees in nine industry sectors of 15

developed and emerging economies.

“Digital technologies, combined with other socio-economic and demographic

changes, will transform labour markets in the next five years, leading to a net

loss of over 5 million jobs in 15 major developed and emerging economies. Whilst

there will be new 2 million jobs created in digital industrial and services sectors,

there will be 7 million job loss in the traditional industrial and services sectors.”

The Disruptive Impact of Digital Revolution on Education as the Foundation of

Wealth Creation is already apparent:

(i) Top Billionaire Tycoons Who do not have University Degrees:

Bill Gates (Harvard, Computing) Microsoft

Larry Ellison (Chicago, Computing) Oracle

Mark Zuckerberg (Harvard, Computing) Facebook

Sheldon Adelson (City College New York) Las Vargas Sands

Michael Dell (Texas) Dell

Steve Jobs (Reed College, Calligraphy) Apple

Ralph Lauren (Baruch College, Business) Luxury Brand

Elizabeth Holmes (Stanford Engineering) Theranos

Jack Dorsey (New York Engineering) Twitter

Noah Glass (Software Developer) Twitter

Biz Stone (Massachusetts) Twitter

Ted Turner (Brown University Economics) CNN

Michael Lazaridis (Waterloo, Engineering) Blackberry

(ii) Top Billionaire Business Tycoons Who Do Not Have PhD Degree:

Jack Ma (Hangzhou, English Language) Alibaba

Jeff Bezos (Princeton, Engineering) Amazon

Larry Page (Michigan & Stanford, Engineering) Google

Sergey Brin (Stanford Computing) Google

Naryana Murthy (ITT Kanpur, Engineering) Infosys

and 6 Partners (Engineering) Infosys

Sir Gordon Wu (Princeton, Engineering) Hopewell

(iii) School Dropout as Tycoon : Ben Pasternak

NEW YORK (FOX 5 NEWS) 22 April 2016- Introducing a 16-year-old CEO. Ben Pasternak

just moved here from his native Australia after receiving funding for his third app.

Pasternak's latest venture is called Flogg. After just one week on the market, Flogg is getting

traction.

EL PAIZ -Ben Pasternak, el genio adolescente de moda. Con solo 16 años se resiste a fichar

por los grandes de Silicon Valley.

MAIL ONLINE UK- Meet the 16-year-old tech tycoon with his own apartment in

Manhattan, and a million-dollar app that just launched worldwide.

DIE WELT: Ben Pasternak New Yorks jüngster Start-up-Millionär ist gerade mal 16.

(iv) Anvitha Vijay

San Francisco 18 June 2016 — She's the Star of Apple's Worldwide Developers

Conference.

Anvitha Vijay, age 9, created an iPad/iPhone App about animals — Smartkins

Animals — in Melbourne, Australia, and applied to be selected for one of the

coveted scholarships to attend Apple's annual developer conference.

Apple CEO Tim Cook gave Vijay a shout-out during his Monday keynote as

the youngest developer ever to attend Apple's WWDC, one of 350 mostly high

school and college students invited by Apple to attend the conference for free.

The Successful Movers and Shakers of our Digital Age Are Young. The Speed

of their Commercial Successes Span Less than A Decade.

As Digital Technologies upgrade themselves one generation every two years in

accordance to Moore’s Law, young entrepreneurs cannot afford to wait for a

PhD or even a bachelor degree. They rather prefer to have a billion or

hundreds of million in US Dollar!

I would advise Engineering Management in Universities to venture into

lifelong continuing professional development courses in a structured manner.

This will be in line with the demands of the digital age and will assure the

financial viability of Engineering Faculties in the universities.

You all Would Have Noticed I Have Highlighted the Successful

Individual Human Beings, who have made their billions when Young .

Many, Unbeknown to Most of Us, are Engineers!

I hold firmly to my conviction that one of the Cardinal Reasons in failing to

interest and attract children and youth to STEM and Engineering is the failure

of the global engineering community to put a Human Face to Engineering!

We proclaimed to the World our outstanding Engineering Structures and

Systems as Supreme Engineering Achievements, rather than the Engineers that

Design and Build those Structures and Systems.

Children and Youth Need Human Icons to inspire them to pursue Engineering.

We are not providing them with the Human Icons.

WFEO seminal document “WFEO Engineering 2030” contains many

Initiatives and Projects for WFEO and her Partners to advance the

achievement of the UN SDGs through Engineering

However, there is not a single photograph of the dedicated engineers, young

and old, that drive all the above commendable initiatives and programmes.

This detracts from its value as an important document of advocacy for

encouraging children and youth to take up engineering.

“The Jewels in China’s Crown” was published in 2018. It documents China’s

Glorious Achievements in :

• China’s Aerospace,

• China’s High Speed Rail,

• China’s Bridges,

• China’s Supercomputers,

• China’s New Energy.

There are some 50 very impressive photographs of China’s engineering

achievements in the above five sectors that lead the world. But not one of the

Engineers that design and build them!

On Page 41-42 on High Speed Train, the Paragraph Heading is “Average Age

of Senior Designers is Around Thirty”

“On December 3 2010, CRH380AL created a world record of 486.1 km/hr in

the testing stage of Beijing-Shanghai section. Liang Jianying, its chief designer,

was 37 years old. Liang, the first female chief designer in China, led a team

that was even younger. Liang became the first female chief engineer of high

speed train in the world. She kept refusing media interviews over and over

again and recommended her colleagues instead “They are young and have a

brighter future”.

What a role model and icon Liang would have made to attract children, girls

and youth to Engineering ! I am sure there are many such role models in

engineering in China.

Perhaps China does not require such human icons. Engineering is attractive

enough in China

The stark contrast between China’s 4.7 million STEM graduates in 2016 and

the US’s 568,000 is one of the reasons for US anxiety over her decline in STI

dominance!

I believe the figures bear further study and analysis in the following aspects:

• As a developing economy, the traditional manufacturing and construction

industries needed for China’s infrastructure development requires more

engineers of the traditional civil, mechanical, electrical and chemical

disciplines.

• China’s position as the Factory of the World also requires more engineers.

• US has let her traditional manufacturing and construction industries

decline in favour of services that are on digital technology related. Hence

there is less need for engineers.

• Through the Belt and Road Initiative, China has become the leader in

infrastructure construction in the developing world. The aged and decaying

infrastructure of the developed world will need China’s expertise and

experience. China will continue to need more engineers.

From 2008 Lecture by the Islamic World Academy of Sciences (IAS) Secretary General Dr Moneef Joubi

The scientists are much better in putting human face to science

Scientists are essential to develop Inquiry Based ScienceEducation (IBSE)

LEDERMANN LEE YEE CHEONG MOLINA CHARPAK ALBERTS HARLEN

WEI YU HAHNE ALLENDE SAMROO LENA QUERE

From 2019 Lecture by Professor Daniel Ruoan, President LAMAP Foundation ParisFrom

2019 Lecture by Professor Daniel Ruoan, President LAMAP Foundation Paris

In above 10 Champions of IBSE, there are three Nobel Laureates:

• The late Leon Lederman, USA , the Father of IBSE

• The late Georges Charpak , France, the Father of La Main a La Pate

• Mario Molina, Mexico

Charpak was a civil engineering and Molina is a chemical engineer.

Apart from the above two, there are three other engineers in the list of 10:

• Wu Yu, China, Chemical Engineer

• Yves Quere, France, Geological Engineer

• Lee Yee Cheong, Malaysia, Electrical Engineer

Nobel Laureate Sir Charles Kuen Kao of Hong Kong

Electrical Engineer; Father of Optical

Fibre; Nobel Prize in Physics 2009

Awarded WFEO Outstanding Engineering

Excellence Award during WFEO General

Assembly in Hong Kong 1997.

Among the long lists of honours and awards

in his CV, WFEO Gold Medal for

Engineering Excellence 1995 was listed.

He remembered WFEO. Did WFEO

remember him?

RECOGNITION

Dato’ Ir. (Dr.) Lee Yee Cheong

Received Award from UNOSSC

Dato’ Lee Yee Cheong, ISTIC Governing Board

Chairman, was honoured with the Triangular Visionary

Leadership Award 2014 by the United Nations Office forSouth-South Cooperation (UNOSSC) at the UN Global

South-South Development Expo 2014 on 17 November

2014 in Washington DC. The award was a recognition of

his leadership in promoting South-South Cooperation

and Triangular Cooperation through ISTIC.

In Conclusion , May I urge all WFEO member institutions to put a human face

to all their engineering endeavours, highlighting the engineers who design,

construct, operate and maintain the engineering structures and systems.

There is nothing better than the local icons to stimulate the interest of children

and youth in STEM and engineering.

May I suggest that under the WFEO banner, CAST undertake a world report

on outstanding engineers, young and old, in both written and video formats,

starting with the five outstanding engineering sectors in the Book “The Jewels

in China’s Crown” and proceeding to highlight engineers in other developing

countries like those who contribute to social and economic development in

their own countries, including win-win engineering partnerships in Belt and

Road Infrastructure Projects.

THANK YOU