Engineering, a field that has shaped the world’s industrial and technological base, is ripe for a... more Engineering, a field that has shaped the world’s industrial and technological base, is ripe for an influx of Latino undergraduate students. Given U.S. Latino population increases, what is the trajectory of Latino participation in engineering education? Using an interdisciplinary lens, we critically examine Latino trends in undergraduate engineering education in the United States. We find that Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) are particularly successful at graduating Latino engineers and propose explanatory analyses.
2017 IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON), 2017
According to the National Science Foundation, increasing the proportion of veterans pursuing engi... more According to the National Science Foundation, increasing the proportion of veterans pursuing engineering degrees will help meet USA's need for more engineers. The USA offers benefits to military veterans to pay for higher education and they bring valuable assets from their service experience to their engineering education. More research is needed to improve institutional efforts to help veterans integrate these assets into their engineering education. In this paper, we draw on focus group data to explore transition issues faced by student veterans as they move from the military to higher education to pursue their undergraduate engineering degrees. We consider transition from the military and transition to the university, focusing on institutional policies and practices, co-curricular supports, and the relationship between service experiences and engineering study.
2017 IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON), 2017
This session will engage participants in how to apply multiple qualitative research methods to ex... more This session will engage participants in how to apply multiple qualitative research methods to examine emerging issues in engineering education. The focus will be on using qualitative methods — grounded theory, thematic analysis, and content analysis — across multiple data collection methods (individual interviews, focus groups, key informant interviews, and policy/programmatic artifacts) and across several institutions. Benefits and challenges associated with data collection, synthesis, analysis, and triangulation across multiple research sites will be discussed, as well as the important role of theoretical frameworks in designing engineering education inquiry. It is expected that participants will gain a greater appreciation of qualitative methods that can be used to answer important questions in engineering education.
International Journal of Engineering Education, 2019
Based on in-depth qualitative interviews with student veterans in the United States pursuing Bach... more Based on in-depth qualitative interviews with student veterans in the United States pursuing Bachelor’s degrees inengineering across four institutions, we present findings relating military leadership and its application to engineeringeducation. Our findings address three themes: (1) how leadership skills are learned, (2) motivation to be a leader, and (3)translation into, and enactment of military leadership skills in, engineering education. The interviews show that leadershipskills and experiences acquired in the military play an important role in the academic experiences and success of studentveterans in engineering (SVEs). Findings can help inform strategies and programs to encourage more SVEs to translatetheir leadership skills to an academic setting in an asset-based framework. Providing leadership opportunities for SVEs inthe classroom has the potential to increase their engagement in engineering, strengthen their pathways to professionalengineering practice, and provide impo...
2018 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2018
This special session will engage participants in how to apply multiple qualitative research metho... more This special session will engage participants in how to apply multiple qualitative research methods to explore the experiences of students, particularly marginalized populations. Throughout the session, we will use our insights and experiences from our collaborative research on student veterans in engineering as an example. The session focuses on using multiple data collection methods (interviews and focus groups) across several institutions. We introduce and discuss the key event timeline and identity circle as qualitative research tools that can be used to answer important questions in engineering education for veterans and other understudied populations. We emphasize the importance of partnerships in such research. Benefits and challenges associated with data collection, synthesis, and analysis, across multiple research sites will be discussed.
2016 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2016
Student veterans have become an increasing presence in higher education. We seek to understand th... more Student veterans have become an increasing presence in higher education. We seek to understand the role of the military as a pathway into engineering for student veteran engineers as well as investigate the character and content of their educational experiences. The results of seven focus groups with 29 student veterans indicate that the decision to major in engineering is often, but not always, related to their service. Veteran students are often open with faculty about their veteran status, however they are less likely to reveal it to other students. Veterans believe that their status as a veteran is a significant asset in engineering studies but that their age is less so.
2015 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2015
Active military and student veterans navigate engineering education in ways both similar to and d... more Active military and student veterans navigate engineering education in ways both similar to and different from their civilian counterparts. This Work in Progress describes variation in institutional environments through interviews with campus administrators and inspection of university websites at four institutions. Three emerging themes are identified: 1) the presence/absence of key student policies, 2) variation in student support services, and 3) gaps in provision of such services. Interviews provide data on the challenges faced and assets brought by veterans, from the point of view of administrators. We find that serving veterans is an area of recent and increasing importance to these institutions and that the level of services offered is evolving to include veterans resource centers, training for students and faculty on veterans' issues, and web portals to access veteran-specific information.
2015 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2015
The University of San Diego (USD)'s NSF ADVANCE grant, AFFIRM (Advancement of Female Faculty:... more The University of San Diego (USD)'s NSF ADVANCE grant, AFFIRM (Advancement of Female Faculty: Institutional climate, Recruitment and Mentoring), focuses on addressing issues related to race and gender for faculty in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM). Although a majority of undergraduate students majoring in most STEM disciplines at USD are female, there are not nearly that many women faculty. As part of the grant proposal, the AFFIRM team was promised two new faculty positions by the Provost. In Fall 2013, the team met with the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and the Dean of the School of Engineering and the idea of hiring a faculty cohort to facilitate mentoring, diversity, and interdisciplinarity emerged and was approved. Over 200 candidates from diverse backgrounds applied. The candidates that came for on-campus interviews were so impressive that the Provost and Deans agreed to additional hiring opportunities, leading to a cohort of eight female faculty in the STEM fields including four women of color. In this work-in-progress, we discuss our innovative cohort hiring process, and share feedback from members of the cohort, and lessons learned. This innovative process could serve as a model for other campuses.
2021 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), Oct 13, 2021
The Multiple Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIEL... more The Multiple Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIELD) is a unique research resource offering student record data at an unprecedented scale. This special session aims to introduce participants to MIDFIELD including the data that it contains and some key results from research using MIDFIELD, explore how to conduct research with such a resource, and explain how participants can access MIDFIELD. Understanding what data is available in MIDFIELD and how to access it will help researchers decide if this is a useful resource for their own research.
International Journal of Engineering Education, 2015
Chemical Engineering (ChE) is one of the engineering disciplines with the highest participation o... more Chemical Engineering (ChE) is one of the engineering disciplines with the highest participation of women. This article describes theexperiences of Black and White women in chemical engineering programs that stand out because they attract and retain women athigher rates than peer institutions. We use a mixed-methods approach, quantitatively describing the trajectories of Black and Whitestudents at three Selected and seven Other institutions using data from a large, multi-institution dataset and qualitatively describingthe experiences of seven Black and nine White women through focus groups at those Selected institutions that were identified as‘‘pockets of success’’ for women through the quantitative findings. We find that Black and White students have better outcomes atSelected institutions than at Other institutions; they are more likely to graduate within six years and more likely to remain in ChE.We find through focus groups that women are attracted to their institutions and departments due to institutional reputation andidentify six reasons that these women stay in ChE at these institutions: Sisterhood, Real-World Experience, Real-World Examples,Faculty Caring, Sense of Accomplishment, and ‘‘I Got This Far.’’ We conclude that institutional reputation is a factor in studentschoosing the institution but that the elements of reputation are different at the Selected institutions. Persistence in ChE appears tobe most highly associated with relatedness. This can manifest through relatedness with other students, faculty who care, and thelarger professional community through real-world experiences and examples.
The Multiple Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIEL... more The Multiple Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIELD) is expanding to include 113 institutions and is being redesigned and archived to be more accessible to researchers. This special session will describe how researchers can better use or gain access to MIDFIELD. At the conclusion of the session participants should be able to: describe MIDFIELD including common data elements, discuss how new variables can be derived from MIDFIELD, understand what is necessary to access the data on the Interuniversity Consortium for Political and Social Research, and define quantitative and qualitative data types and structures and outline research questions and methods of personal interest to them.
Engineering, a field that has shaped the world’s industrial and technological base, is ripe for a... more Engineering, a field that has shaped the world’s industrial and technological base, is ripe for an influx of Latino undergraduate students. Given U.S. Latino population increases, what is the trajectory of Latino participation in engineering education? Using an interdisciplinary lens, we critically examine Latino trends in undergraduate engineering education in the United States. We find that Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) are particularly successful at graduating Latino engineers and propose explanatory analyses.
2017 IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON), 2017
According to the National Science Foundation, increasing the proportion of veterans pursuing engi... more According to the National Science Foundation, increasing the proportion of veterans pursuing engineering degrees will help meet USA's need for more engineers. The USA offers benefits to military veterans to pay for higher education and they bring valuable assets from their service experience to their engineering education. More research is needed to improve institutional efforts to help veterans integrate these assets into their engineering education. In this paper, we draw on focus group data to explore transition issues faced by student veterans as they move from the military to higher education to pursue their undergraduate engineering degrees. We consider transition from the military and transition to the university, focusing on institutional policies and practices, co-curricular supports, and the relationship between service experiences and engineering study.
2017 IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON), 2017
This session will engage participants in how to apply multiple qualitative research methods to ex... more This session will engage participants in how to apply multiple qualitative research methods to examine emerging issues in engineering education. The focus will be on using qualitative methods — grounded theory, thematic analysis, and content analysis — across multiple data collection methods (individual interviews, focus groups, key informant interviews, and policy/programmatic artifacts) and across several institutions. Benefits and challenges associated with data collection, synthesis, analysis, and triangulation across multiple research sites will be discussed, as well as the important role of theoretical frameworks in designing engineering education inquiry. It is expected that participants will gain a greater appreciation of qualitative methods that can be used to answer important questions in engineering education.
International Journal of Engineering Education, 2019
Based on in-depth qualitative interviews with student veterans in the United States pursuing Bach... more Based on in-depth qualitative interviews with student veterans in the United States pursuing Bachelor’s degrees inengineering across four institutions, we present findings relating military leadership and its application to engineeringeducation. Our findings address three themes: (1) how leadership skills are learned, (2) motivation to be a leader, and (3)translation into, and enactment of military leadership skills in, engineering education. The interviews show that leadershipskills and experiences acquired in the military play an important role in the academic experiences and success of studentveterans in engineering (SVEs). Findings can help inform strategies and programs to encourage more SVEs to translatetheir leadership skills to an academic setting in an asset-based framework. Providing leadership opportunities for SVEs inthe classroom has the potential to increase their engagement in engineering, strengthen their pathways to professionalengineering practice, and provide impo...
2018 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2018
This special session will engage participants in how to apply multiple qualitative research metho... more This special session will engage participants in how to apply multiple qualitative research methods to explore the experiences of students, particularly marginalized populations. Throughout the session, we will use our insights and experiences from our collaborative research on student veterans in engineering as an example. The session focuses on using multiple data collection methods (interviews and focus groups) across several institutions. We introduce and discuss the key event timeline and identity circle as qualitative research tools that can be used to answer important questions in engineering education for veterans and other understudied populations. We emphasize the importance of partnerships in such research. Benefits and challenges associated with data collection, synthesis, and analysis, across multiple research sites will be discussed.
2016 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2016
Student veterans have become an increasing presence in higher education. We seek to understand th... more Student veterans have become an increasing presence in higher education. We seek to understand the role of the military as a pathway into engineering for student veteran engineers as well as investigate the character and content of their educational experiences. The results of seven focus groups with 29 student veterans indicate that the decision to major in engineering is often, but not always, related to their service. Veteran students are often open with faculty about their veteran status, however they are less likely to reveal it to other students. Veterans believe that their status as a veteran is a significant asset in engineering studies but that their age is less so.
2015 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2015
Active military and student veterans navigate engineering education in ways both similar to and d... more Active military and student veterans navigate engineering education in ways both similar to and different from their civilian counterparts. This Work in Progress describes variation in institutional environments through interviews with campus administrators and inspection of university websites at four institutions. Three emerging themes are identified: 1) the presence/absence of key student policies, 2) variation in student support services, and 3) gaps in provision of such services. Interviews provide data on the challenges faced and assets brought by veterans, from the point of view of administrators. We find that serving veterans is an area of recent and increasing importance to these institutions and that the level of services offered is evolving to include veterans resource centers, training for students and faculty on veterans' issues, and web portals to access veteran-specific information.
2015 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), 2015
The University of San Diego (USD)'s NSF ADVANCE grant, AFFIRM (Advancement of Female Faculty:... more The University of San Diego (USD)'s NSF ADVANCE grant, AFFIRM (Advancement of Female Faculty: Institutional climate, Recruitment and Mentoring), focuses on addressing issues related to race and gender for faculty in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM). Although a majority of undergraduate students majoring in most STEM disciplines at USD are female, there are not nearly that many women faculty. As part of the grant proposal, the AFFIRM team was promised two new faculty positions by the Provost. In Fall 2013, the team met with the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and the Dean of the School of Engineering and the idea of hiring a faculty cohort to facilitate mentoring, diversity, and interdisciplinarity emerged and was approved. Over 200 candidates from diverse backgrounds applied. The candidates that came for on-campus interviews were so impressive that the Provost and Deans agreed to additional hiring opportunities, leading to a cohort of eight female faculty in the STEM fields including four women of color. In this work-in-progress, we discuss our innovative cohort hiring process, and share feedback from members of the cohort, and lessons learned. This innovative process could serve as a model for other campuses.
2021 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), Oct 13, 2021
The Multiple Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIEL... more The Multiple Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIELD) is a unique research resource offering student record data at an unprecedented scale. This special session aims to introduce participants to MIDFIELD including the data that it contains and some key results from research using MIDFIELD, explore how to conduct research with such a resource, and explain how participants can access MIDFIELD. Understanding what data is available in MIDFIELD and how to access it will help researchers decide if this is a useful resource for their own research.
International Journal of Engineering Education, 2015
Chemical Engineering (ChE) is one of the engineering disciplines with the highest participation o... more Chemical Engineering (ChE) is one of the engineering disciplines with the highest participation of women. This article describes theexperiences of Black and White women in chemical engineering programs that stand out because they attract and retain women athigher rates than peer institutions. We use a mixed-methods approach, quantitatively describing the trajectories of Black and Whitestudents at three Selected and seven Other institutions using data from a large, multi-institution dataset and qualitatively describingthe experiences of seven Black and nine White women through focus groups at those Selected institutions that were identified as‘‘pockets of success’’ for women through the quantitative findings. We find that Black and White students have better outcomes atSelected institutions than at Other institutions; they are more likely to graduate within six years and more likely to remain in ChE.We find through focus groups that women are attracted to their institutions and departments due to institutional reputation andidentify six reasons that these women stay in ChE at these institutions: Sisterhood, Real-World Experience, Real-World Examples,Faculty Caring, Sense of Accomplishment, and ‘‘I Got This Far.’’ We conclude that institutional reputation is a factor in studentschoosing the institution but that the elements of reputation are different at the Selected institutions. Persistence in ChE appears tobe most highly associated with relatedness. This can manifest through relatedness with other students, faculty who care, and thelarger professional community through real-world experiences and examples.
The Multiple Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIEL... more The Multiple Institution Database for Investigating Engineering Longitudinal Development (MIDFIELD) is expanding to include 113 institutions and is being redesigned and archived to be more accessible to researchers. This special session will describe how researchers can better use or gain access to MIDFIELD. At the conclusion of the session participants should be able to: describe MIDFIELD including common data elements, discuss how new variables can be derived from MIDFIELD, understand what is necessary to access the data on the Interuniversity Consortium for Political and Social Research, and define quantitative and qualitative data types and structures and outline research questions and methods of personal interest to them.
This work critically studies the contemporary problems of one segment of science, technology, eng... more This work critically studies the contemporary problems of one segment of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education. The lack of a diverse U.S.-based pool of talent entering the field of engineering education has been termed a crisis by academic and political leaders. Engineering remains one of the most sex segregated academic arenas; the intersection of gendered and racialized exclusion results in very few Latina engineers. Drawing on cutting-edge scholarship in gender and Latino/a studies, the book provides an analytically incisive view of the experiences of Latina engineers.
Sponsored by the National Science Foundation through a Gender in Science and Engineering grant, the authors bridge interdisciplinary perspectives to illuminate the nuanced and multiple exclusionary forces that shape the culture of engineering. A large, multi-institution, longitudinal dataset permits disaggregation by race and gender. The authors rely on primary and secondary sources and incorporate an integrated mixed-methods approach combining quantitative and qualitative data. Together, this analysis of the voices of Latina engineering majors breaks new ground in the literature on STEM education and provides an exemplar for future research on subpopulations in these fields.
This book is aimed at researchers who study underrepresented groups in engineering and are interested in broadening participation and ameliorating problems of exclusion. It will be attractive to scholars in the fields of multicultural and higher education, sociology, cultural anthropology, cultural studies, and feminist technology studies, and all researchers interested in the intersections of STEM, race, and gender. This resource will be useful for policy-makers and educational leaders looking to revitalize and re-envision the culture within engineering
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative... more This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY
Uploads
Sponsored by the National Science Foundation through a Gender in Science and Engineering grant, the authors bridge interdisciplinary perspectives to illuminate the nuanced and multiple exclusionary forces that shape the culture of engineering. A large, multi-institution, longitudinal dataset permits disaggregation by race and gender. The authors rely on primary and secondary sources and incorporate an integrated mixed-methods approach combining quantitative and qualitative data. Together, this analysis of the voices of Latina engineering majors breaks new ground in the literature on STEM education and provides an exemplar for future research on subpopulations in these fields.
This book is aimed at researchers who study underrepresented groups in engineering and are interested in broadening participation and ameliorating problems of exclusion. It will be attractive to scholars in the fields of multicultural and higher education, sociology, cultural anthropology, cultural studies, and feminist technology studies, and all researchers interested in the intersections of STEM, race, and gender. This resource will be useful for policy-makers and educational leaders looking to revitalize and re-envision the culture within engineering