Leveraging Ontologies in Engineering Education: Top-Down and Bottom-Up Approaches

Abstract Engineering education is an ever-evolving field that covers a wide range of interconnected disciplines; therefore, educators and students must navigate the body of knowledge efficiently. Given this complexity, this research investigates potential applications of ontologies to enhance aerospace engineering education. The paper will first explore the advantages of incorporating ontologies in engineering education. From this perspective, ontologies serve as a framework that systematically organizes information to create an enhanced educational environment. Then, the paper proposes top-down and bottom-up approaches to ontology integrations in engineering education, where the former enables instructors to provide students with a framework that lays the groundwork for a better understanding of fundamental concepts. In contrast, the latter empowers students to offer context to instructors while contributing detailed insights into subject matters. Lastly, this paper illustrates use cases utilizing the top-down and bottom-up approaches, showcasing the potential use of ontology framework in aerospace engineering education.