I graduated as an aircraft engineer from Delft Technical University in 1985, on a master's thesis in aircraft stability and control.
Before I took the plunge of enrolling in Delft as a commuter student, I studied physics in Amsterdam for a year as a preparation. I always knew I wanted to study aircraft, not physics, but I just didn't have the confidence.
I consider myself lucky, but I see some things now in a light that only dawned on me gradually over the years.
The first three years of the five year course in Delft were the same for every student of aircraft engineering. It was mostly theory of a practical kind, in mechanics, drawing, structures, aerodynamics and aircraft design. I was keenly interested in everything I learned, and I had a wonderful time, except on a personal level but that had nothing to do with Delft.
The third year was an extended design exercise, where you got a spec and were supposed to do a conceptual design study, devising and comparing three concepts for the spec you were handed, then doing a preliminary design of the selected concept, then doing one or two structural detail designs and drawings.
The final two years were supposed to be the fun part. Here you specialized in your favourite branch, either aerodynamics, structures, or control. By this time, perfectionism, 4 hours of travel per day and a less than fulfilling personal life caught up with me, and the five year course, which normally took six years anyway, cost me a full ten years, spent partly on a period of inert depression.
In retrospect, I think this came from a combination of being a first generation student, cocky but not very self assured, idealistic but not very brave, and afraid or refusing to bow to the mores of an essentially upper class world. Almost all of my fellow students had at least a KLM pilot, but most often a university trained engineer as a father. This was an inherited class and profession.
Every lecture opened with "Madam, gentlemen...", regardless of whether, and if so how many, women were in the room ( in my year, one lady and 60 gentlemen.. ), or their age ( usually 18 or 19, in my case 23 ).
I came out well, but it put me at a disadvantage, and I lost a lot of time and opportunity as a result.
An interesting sidelight on class distinctions was the relation between Delft and the University of Leiden. Delft students went out in Leiden in the weekends, because that was where the girls were. When they had to catch the last train back to Delft, the male Leiden law and economics students poked fun at them : "Yes, you go home now and study very hard, so later you can work very hard for me".
An important item in the first year at Delft was the sketching exercise. After a short introduction into the basics of pencil sketching on soft, large grid paper, we were left to roam the huge study collection of aircraft parts.
A dedicated member of staff was continuously at work in the hall to cut open interesting structural details of recently scrapped aircraft. From the early days, there was the wing spar of a Spitfire and the complete wing of an Me-109, showing by cutouts in the wing box how a stiffened rib halfway the span transferred torsion from the front of the wing box to the rear, clearing the big holes for the undercarriage and the guns. There were uncovered parts of wooden gliders. There was a Cessna 172 cut in half, showing the seemingly flimsy but very clever fuselage cross-section. There was a Saab Safir, cut open to reveal the inner workings of the elevator and aileron linkages. There was a working ( and I mean powered ) hydraulic undercarriage leg of a B-25 Mitchell, and a myriad of other interesting stuff to touch, smell, ponder and sketch.
The dean gave an introductory series of lectures, telling stories about his internships in the British aviation industry, interesting test flights, fun books on structures, and very British autobiographies of famous designers.
Such books were readily available from the faculty library, as were all NACA reports of the last century, which you could simply take out from the endless rows of steel cabinets and if desired take home for a week or two.
The study collection has since been cleared out to make space for aisles of nondescript test benches. The latest dean of the faculty only had a PhD in math, and declared in an interview that she had no intention of staying on for very long, because she had no interest in calculating wings for the rest of her life.
I was not aware at the time that I had lived through a major change in focus for the university during my stay.
Delft University was called "Technische Hogeschool Delft" ( Delft Technical High School ) when I enrolled, and despite the name, to me it was the pinnacle of science. In the year that I started, the name changed to "Technische Universiteit Delft" ( Delft Technical University ), and the department I joined changed its name from "Vliegtuigbouw" ( Aircraft Construction ) to "Lucht en Ruimtevaarttechniek" ( Air and Space Technology ).
I disliked rockets and so I disliked the new logo, but apart from that I did not really stop to think about it. I can now see that the change was profound. It was really the change from a Polytechnic to a University of Technology.
For the whole of my career, I have always had at least two or three interns in my office-cum-workshop. The total amounts to many dozens, most of them from Delft University.
It soon dawned on me that these students had a totally different focus than I ever had. They were graded on the "scientific" content of their graduation thesis, not on whether it made any sense. I checked this with members of staff, and it turned out that there was ( and as it seems still is today ) a difference of opinion, or style, over the mission of a technical university.
It is my firm belief that a technical university should teach design, not science for its own sake, and it should produce designers, not scientists. In my days there was the standing joke on Delft that if you graduated there you had to be a great engineer, to have survived such indifferent teacher support. The same thing now holds if you emerge as a good designer. You must have had a firm purpose in mind to have survived the active sabotage of your purpose in the curriculum.
I think it comes down to the difference between synthesis and analysis. They are different art forms. An engineer starts from a fairly vague need or requirement, and out of thin air ( and many years of experience, and a thorough background knowledge ) creates or finds solutions, analyzes them on basic principles, weeds out the bad ones, selects the good ones, finds the parts, designs the details, and finishes the job in a finite amount of time. This is synthesis. There was a jumble before you came, and you created a whole.
Analysis starts at the other end. Someone created something, a design or a theory, and it is your job to analyze this in ever greater depth and detail. Typically, there is no end to this. "Further research is needed".
Both professions are needed, but they require a totally different mindset. Scientists often show a disdain for engineers, who generate only quick and dirty work, with glaring mistakes and shortcomings. But it is easy to criticize from the ivory tower if you never had to plow the fields below. Or in naval language, "the best helmsmen stand ashore". Or as a practicing engineer would say : "Those who can, do. Those who can't teach."
In all fairness, my comments apply only to the Aerospace department. From what I hear, and from the books they publish, the Delft department of Industrial Design does a very good job of educating design professionals.