The tension between academic and professional aims of engineering education is a remarkably consistent challenge facing engineering educators. Here, some historical roots of this issue are traced through the life and work of Carl Richard Söderberg (1895–1979), who emigrated from Sweden to the US for an illustrious industrial and academic career. While Söderberg was a proponent for a more science-based curriculum, his rationale was related to solving real professional problems, and he would come to criticise the distancing of engineering education from engineering practice. Söderberg's views are compared to a present-day reform concept for engineering education, the CDIO approach, founded by MIT and three Swedish universities. The similarities show the persistence of the issue, as many of Söderberg's ideals, arguments, and proposed strategies are fully recognisable in the current discussion. Further, Söderberg and CDIO share the ideal of mutually supporting professional and disciplinary preparation, implying that the tension should not be a zero-sum game. The paths to this ideal were different, however, as Söderberg wanted to integrate theoretical aspects to improve an overly practical education, while CDIO is about improving an overly theoretical education by integrating also other necessary professional aspects.

工程教育的学术目标与专业目标之间的紧张关系是工程教育者面临的始终如一的挑战。在这里，这个问题的某些历史渊源可以追溯到卡尔·理查德·索德伯格（Carl RichardSöderberg，1895-1979年）的生活和工作，卡尔·理查德·索德伯格（Carl RichardSöderberg）从瑞典移民到美国，从事着杰出的工业和学术事业。尽管Söderberg主张采用以科学为基础的课程，但他的论点与解决实际的专业问题有关，他会批评工程教育与工程实践之间的距离。Söderberg的观点与当今的工程教育改革概念，CDIO方法（由MIT和三所瑞典大学共同创立）进行了比较。相似之处表明问题的持续性，因为索德伯格的许多理想，论据，在当前的讨论中，建议的策略是完全可以识别的。此外，Söderberg和CDIO具有相互支持的专业和学科准备工作的理想，这意味着紧张关系不应该是零和游戏。然而，实现这一理想的途径是不同的，因为Söderberg希望整合理论方面来改善过度的实践教育，而CDIO则要通过整合其他必要的专业方面来改善过度的理论教育。