Integrating Green Manufacturing Concepts into Industrial Engineering Education: A Curriculum Simulation to Strengthen Students’ Environmental Literacy

Abstract

This study designed and simulated an instructional model for integrating green manufacturing concepts into industrial engineering education to strengthen students’ environmental literacy. The study responded to the tendency of manufacturing courses to emphasize productivity, cost, and quality while treating environmental considerations as supplementary content. A design-oriented literature synthesis and curriculum simulation were employed. Green manufacturing principles were mapped onto four environmental literacy dimensions: knowledge, cognitive skills, attitudes and values, and action competence. Two eight-week curriculum scenarios were then compared: a conventional lecture-centered model and an integrated model combining material and energy flow analysis, cleaner production, life-cycle thinking, circular economy, contextual industrial cases, collaborative projects, and reflective assessment. A transparent opportunity-to-learn rubric was used to score curriculum coverage; the scores represented design characteristics rather than observed student achievement. The simulation showed that the integrated scenario provided substantially broader and deeper coverage across all environmental literacy dimensions, particularly cognitive application and action competence. The proposed model also linked technical analysis with the spatial and social consequences of industrial activity, enabling students to consider communities, workers, resource users, and other stakeholders in engineering decisions. The study concluded that green manufacturing should be embedded across learning outcomes, content, pedagogy, assessment, and partnerships rather than offered as an isolated topic. A phased implementation involving lecturer preparation, local industry collaboration, project-based assessment, and empirical pilot evaluation was recommended.