Interdisciplinariedad en la educación superior: conectando universidad y sociedad

In recent years, a paradigm shift in the role of science and technology in society proposes the need to face the significant challenges of socio-environmental development problems. These are complex intersectional and require interdisciplinary frameworks to understand and deal with them. This article questions how the university can become crucial for implementing a quality higher education that provides students with the skills required to address these complex problems. Based on the case of the University of Engineering and Technology-UTEC of Peru, it is proposed that the HASS disciplines (Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences) have the potential to provide students with the methodologies and tools to understand development problems as complex and above all subjective issues; and, they also contribute to making interdisciplinarity operational with the STEM disciplines (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). Through developing courses and academic activities designed by the Department of HASS and the Academic Coordination, UTEC students learn to identify a global or general problem, considering the multidimensionality, the spaces for debate and the associated actors. This way, they can land it in a local, routine, and concrete context, generating human solutions.