The emergence of engineering education research in Portugal and Ireland

The American Society for Engineering Education is the oldest professional society in the world that is solely dedicated to the betterment of engineering education. In its early days, ASEE was a gathering of faculty who wanted to improve the practice of engineering education through experimentation with new curricula, new teaching styles, or new gadgets. Presentations often consisted of "this is what I did" and "this is how the students reacted." Beginning in the 1990s, through the influx of federal dollars in the Coalitions, a new discipline began to emerge-Engineering Education- And along with this discipline a research area was born. At this point in time, the concept of rigorous Engineering Education Research (EER) is fairly well-established in the US, with dedicated programs for EER at the National Science Foundation, PhD degree programs in EER, and the reinvention of the Journal of Engineering Education to support this endeavour. Departments dedicated at least in part to Engineering Education Research are emerging on campuses across the country. There has also been an emergence of Engineering Education Research across the globe; however, efforts in other countries have often been slower due to many factors. This paper describes the emergenceof Engineering Education Research in two countries in the European Union-Portugal and Ireland. The evolution of EER in these two countries is set in a larger global context.