Industry 4.0 Competencies as the Core of Online Engineering Laboratories - Research Report

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by nayy☆

Online laboratories play a central role in higher engineering education and became even more significant during the COVID-19 pandemic. At Tecnologico de Monterrey, Mexico, Problem-Based Learning (PBL), Project-Oriented Learning (POL), and Research-Based Learning (RBL) have been incorporated into online and remote laboratories. The work addresses a missing element—Industry 4.0 competencies—by proposing a pedagogy that combines virtual environments and products with fundamental engineering concepts, then measures students’ perceived self-efficacy via physiological states and mastery experiences.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages22

Reading Time55 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

Key Words

Introduction

Types of Online Laboratories

Impact of COVID-19 on Online Learning

Learning Techniques and Guidance in Online Laboratories

Industry 4.0 Competencies as the Core of Online Engineering Laboratories. Emmanuel Garcia-Moran, Tecnológico de Monterrey, México Donovan Esqueda, Tecnológico de Monterrey, México Jose De Jesus Solis-Cordova, Tecnológico de Monterrey, México Luis Villagomez, Tecnológico de Monterrey, México Hector Morano, Tecnológico de Monterrey, México Rafael Ramirez, Tenneco – Federal-Mogul, México Abstract Online laboratories are widely used in higher engineering education and due to the COVID-19 pandemic, they have taken on an even greater relevance. At Tecnologico de Monterrey, Mexico, well-established techniques such as Problem-Based Learning (PBL), Project-Oriented Learning (POL) and Research-Based Learning (RBL) have been implemented over the years, andover the past year, have been successfully incorporated into the students’ learning process within online and remote laboratories. Nevertheless, these learning techniques do not include an element which is crucial in today’s industrialized world: Industry 4.0 competencies. Therefore, this work aims to describe a pedagogical approach in which the development of Industry based competencies complements the aforementioned learning techniques. The use and creation of virtual environments and products is merged with the understanding of fundamental engineering concepts. Further, a measurement of the students’ perceived selfefficacy related to this pedagogical approach is carried out, focusing on the physiological states and mastery experiences of the students. An analysis of its results is presented as well as a discussion on these findings, coupled with the perspectives from different key stakeholders on the importance of the educational institutions’ involvement in developing Industry 4.0 competencies in engineering students. Finally, comments regarding additional factors which play a role in the educational process, but were not studied at this time, as well as additional areas of interest are given. Key Words Educational Innovation; Higher Education; Digitalization; Online laboratories; Industry 4.0; Engineering Education. Introduction Laboratories are widely used in higher engineering education due to the necessity of not only learning, but implementing engineering concepts as part of the pedagogical process. Several strategies have been implemented since the early 2000’s to provide web-based, hands-on approaches thanks to the possibility of accessing facilities remotely. Such approaches maintain the traditional objectives of on-site facilities, such as demonstrating analytic concepts, exposing students to a broad range of issues and potential problems, and comparing theoretical and real-world results (Heradio et al., 2016; Potkonjak et al., 2016) . Thus, these online laboratories, or experimentation environments, are often grouped in the following manner (Gomes & Bogosyan, 2009; Heradio et al., 2016; Potkonjak et al., 2016): • Physical laboratories, where students are present in facilities equipped with specialized devices, either physical, virtual, or even a mixture of both, and these are used to develop the aforementioned hands-on experiences. • Remote laboratories, where a student is able to exploit existing infrastructure using an Internet connection, usually visualizing real-time events through webcams. • Virtual laboratories, which mainly use simulation packages to deliver the practical component of engineering education. The software is normally based on mathematical models of varying complexities and allows for a wide range of experiences, without the need of costly experiments. Moreover, these approaches have been used in several disciplines with varying results, and lately, their impact generated is being studied with increasing frequency. For example, Gravier et al. (2012) discuss a collaborative online laboratory strategy and its association with both the tutor’s pedagogical objectives, and the management of the group of participating students. Ma

FAQs

Why are online engineering laboratories important in higher education?

They support engineering education by enabling students to learn and apply engineering concepts remotely, and their relevance increased substantially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

What gap does the work identify in existing learning techniques?

The paper states that common learning techniques used in online laboratories do not include Industry 4.0 competencies, which are crucial in today’s industrialized world.

How is the proposed pedagogy evaluated?

The study measures students’ perceived self-efficacy related to the approach, focusing on physiological states and mastery experiences, and then analyzes the results and stakeholder perspectives.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by nayy☆