Our Goals 

Introduce a wide variety of students to 

standards and standardization 

Highlight and nurture personal connections 

Increase the quality, quantity, and diversity 

of the standards workforce 
Curriculum Development at Stevens 

1. HST 380, Standardization and Society 

- Credit toward STS and Sci Comm majors 

- Upper-level Humanities credit for everyone else 

2. Design Spine 

- 8-semester sequence of courses required for all 

engineering undergraduates 

- Flexible content modules (2-3 weeks, 2 hours per 

session) on “Standards and Innovation” 
HST 380, Standardization and Society 

HST 380 provides an interdisciplinary overview of 

the place of standardization in modern societies. 

Students will explore how standards play important 

roles in shaping their lives as consumers and 

citizens, as well as how they might participate in the 

development and use of standards in technical and 

social fields. 

14 weeks, one 2.5 hour session per week 
HST 380, Standardization and Society 

Syllabus Highlights: 

Week 1: Simulation Game 

Weeks 2-3: Analytical Tools 

Weeks 4-6: Engineering, Computers, the Internet 

Week 7: Guest lecture – Lisa Rajchel and John Day 

Weeks 8-11: Biology, Medicine, Life Insurance, 

Automobiles, Food 

Week 12: Simulation Game 

Week 13: Student Presentations 

Week 14: Assessment! 

Weekly student blogs: 

stevensstandardsandsociety.blogspot.com 
HST 380, Standardization and Society 

Goal: Convince a wide diversity of students to care 

about standardization 

Opportunities: Collaboration within Stevens and with 

other universities and organizations 

- IEEE-SA 

- ANSI 

- ASTM 

- Stevens engineering and business faculty 

Surprises: New majors and minors in STS; new 

topics for research 
Design Spine 

An 8-semester sequence of courses required of all 

engineering majors at Stevens (~500/year) 

Purpose: to develop competencies in creative 

thinking, problem solving, teamwork, economics of 

engineering, project management, communication 

skills, ethics, environmental awareness, and systems 

thinking. 

Ongoing reforms: infuse Design Spine with 

emphasis on innovation and entrepreneurship 

Need: fresh content modules that engage students 
Design Spine 

Design for Standardization: General Overview 

1. Look around: what standards do you see, and 

what do we know about them? 

2. How can you learn about the standards you see? 

3. What values do standards embody? What are the 

tradeoffs between costs and benefits? 

4. Where are standards in your design project, and 

what values do they promote? 

What can you do if you don’t like the standards, or if 

you want to promote different values? 
Design Spine 

Design for Standardization: 

Civil, Oceanic, and Environmental Engineering 

1. Lecture on Innovation, Disasters, and Standards 

2. Assignment: Disasters in History 

3. Discussion: What standards emerged as 

responses to disasters? How? 
Design Spine 

Design for Standardization: 

Chemical Engineering & Materials Science 

1. Lecture on Innovation and Standardization 

2. Assignment: Standards for 3D Printing 

3. Discussion: What is the relationship between 

innovation, creativity, and standardization? 
 

Design Spine 

Design for Standardization: Future plans 

1. Modules need to be discipline-specific 

2. Potential collaboration: 

- Electrical and Computer Engineering (leverage IEEE 

History Center at Stevens) 

- Physics and Engineering Physics 

3. Challenges: 

How can we scale up? 

Videos and multimedia? 

Closer contact with engineering faculty? 
Engagement Strategies 

Start with something familiar 

Connect with values that matter to students 

Provide conceptual tools for students to 

appreciate the power of standards 

Appeal to the priorities of faculty in various 

engineering disciplines 
To collaborate, critique, or learn more: 

Andrew L. Russell (arussell@stevens.edu) 

Lee Vinsel (lvinsel@stevens.edu) 

This work was performed under cooperative agreement 

No. 70NANB13H207 from U.S. Department of 

Commerce, National Institute for Standards and 

Technology 

Program in Science & Technology Studies 

College of Arts & Letters