[CCoE Notice] Cullen College Dissertation Announcement- Kristin L. Schaefer, P.E.

[Hutchinson, Inez A]

[Dissertation Defense Announcement at the Cullen College of Engineering]

Investigating Persistent Engineering Identity Development Among Women In Engineering

Kristin L. Schaefer, P.E.

March 27, 2024; 3:00 PM - 5:00 pM (CST)
Location: S234, Eng Bld 1
For Zoom, contact: jahende6 at cougarnet.uh.edu

Committee Chair:
Jerrod A. Henderson, Ph.D.

Committee Members:
Pradeep Sharma, Ph.D. | Dong Liu, Ph.D. | Fritz Claydon, Ph.D. | Catherine L. Horn, Ph.D.

Abstract

Despite many US policies aimed at increasing female representation, the total proportion of women earning bachelor’s degrees in engineering has remained near 20% for over 16 years at all degree levels. One way to broaden participation among women has been to create outreach (or enrichment programs) for middle school girls. The overall number of engineering degrees awarded has been increasing, yet the gender percentage hovers, inviting a question of outreach effectiveness.

Current peer-reviewed literature is scarce for this age, and only a few enrichment programs have defined their effectiveness beyond the traditional “end-of-program” survey. In this study, phenomenological qualitative research design enabled the innovative recruitment of persisted participants to determine what they consider to be their outreaches’ most effective features facilitating their engineering identity (eID) trajectory. A systematic literature review determined five emergent facets of identity that contribute to the definition of eID: competence, self-efficacy, attitude, belonging, and mentors. Similarly, there were five attributes appearing as typical substitutes for achieved persistence in the literature: career goals, interest, motivation, knowledge, and “pipeline” retention. Facets of positive, strong eID are discussed as contributing to persistence, with negatives of those facets as reasons not to persist.

Using a prescreening questionnaire to achieve a stratified purposeful sampling strategy, the study compared the experiences of four participants from targeted (girls-only) outreach and generic (coed) outreach via participant interviews, with two distinct persistence groups along the chemical engineering pathway (e.g., women who are engineering majors in college, and who are career-aged with engineering jobs). Without ties to a specific middle school outreach, this study highlights intrinsic motivation as each woman was supported by her aptitude and interests, as well as extrinsic motivation from a sense of belonging, specifically recalling connections with mentors during the outreach. The additional support of their families, while not directly part of the outreach, can be bolstered by enrichment programs through informational assistance. These “core memory” features must be present in an enrichment program in order to inspire the desired female persistence in engineering and to shift the overall female representation in engineering to gender parity..

[Engineered For What's Next]

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