Collaborative Research: Improving Performance and Retention of Engineering Graduate Students through Motivation and Identity Formation

合作研究：通过动机和身份形成提高工程研究生的表现和保留率

• 批准号: 1535453
• 负责人: Adam Kirn
• 金额: $ 24.95万
• 依托单位: Board of Regents, NSHE, obo University of Nevada, Reno
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-09-01 至 2020-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1535453&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Improving; Performance; Retention

This work is supported by the EHR Core Research (ECR) program. The ECR program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that generates foundational knowledge in the field. Investments are made in critical areas that are essential, broad and enduring: STEM learning and STEM learning environments, broadening participation in STEM, and STEM workforce development. The program supports the accumulation of robust evidence to inform efforts to understand, build theory to explain, and suggest intervention and innovations to address persistent challenges in STEM interest, education, learning and participation. This ECR project intends to understand how doctoral engineering student experiences influence identity formation and motivation and therefore affect retention, persistence and productivity. While this has been widely studied at the undergraduate level, graduate-level studies are less available. Engineering is the least studied fields in graduate education, and if studied, is often combined with other STEM fields, despite unique disciplinary cultures. Engineering culture traditionally values industry-driven careers over academically-driven careers. The focus on career preparation and industry-relevant experiences can also lead to limited development of research-oriented skills and future goals by engineering students. Students coming in with limited definitions of research, particularly research in an engineering context, can experience a mismatch between their identities, their future goals and expectations for them as researchers. The proposed work could benefit engineering graduate students who may be at risk of abandoning their educational pursuits in engineering. Increasing retention of talented individuals in graduate engineering programs increases the number of individuals who can train the new graduates needed to solve the next generation of engineering problems. Unique approaches to problems solved by engineers are essential as growing global competition and increased emphasis on new technology drive the need for creative engineers. A goal of the study is to shape graduate education best practices for recruitment, retention, and training in engineering, particularly for doctoral students in engineering, but elements of this work will be transferable to other populations within graduate education. Through a mixed methods study of graduate student motivational goal setting and identity formation the following research questions will be answered: 1. What are the identity and motivation profiles of engineering doctoral students, which are based on previous academic and research experiences in STEM? 2. How does the STEM community influence identity formation and motivational goal setting processes of engineering doctoral students? 3. How do these processes related to identity formation and motivation influence engineering graduate student retention, productivity, and pursuit of doctoral level engineering careers? In the initial quantitative phase, development, administration, and analysis of a survey to assess the experiences of a nationally-representative sample of currently-enrolled engineering graduate students will be completed. Data will be analyzed using advanced clustering techniques to create attitudinal profiles that reflect graduate students' identity and motivation. To maximize the sample size, students will be recruited through engineering societies and targeted solicitations to graduate engineering programs. In the qualitative second phase up to 50 students of varying attitudinal profiles will be selected to study the influence of graduate experiences on identity development and motivational goal setting. Using a phenomenological lens, students will be interviewed about their experiences in graduate engineering education. Through the mixed-methods approach, the interactions of students' identities and motivation will be captured and how academic experiences influence these profiles will be determined. Results can be used to inform programmatic decisions in graduate programs and facilitate interventions that promote motivation and identity development.

这项工作得到了EHR核心研究（ECR）计划的支持。 ECR计划强调基础STEM教育研究，产生该领域的基础知识。 投资是在关键领域是必不可少的，广泛的和持久的：干学习和干学习环境，扩大参与干，干劳动力发展。 该计划支持积累强有力的证据，为理解，建立理论解释，并建议干预和创新，以解决STEM兴趣，教育，学习和参与方面的持续挑战提供信息。 这个ECR项目旨在了解博士工程学生的经历如何影响身份的形成和动机，从而影响保留，持久性和生产力。 虽然这在本科阶段得到了广泛的研究，但研究生阶段的研究较少。 工程是研究生教育中研究最少的领域，如果研究，通常与其他STEM领域相结合，尽管有独特的学科文化。工程文化传统上重视行业驱动的职业生涯，而不是学术驱动的职业生涯。对职业准备和行业相关经验的关注也可能导致工程专业学生对研究型技能和未来目标的发展有限。学生进来与有限的研究定义，特别是在工程背景下的研究，可以体验他们的身份，他们的未来目标和期望之间的不匹配，他们作为研究人员。 拟议的工作可能有利于工程研究生谁可能会放弃他们的工程教育追求的风险。在研究生工程项目中增加人才的保留，增加了能够培养解决下一代工程问题所需的新毕业生的人数。工程师解决问题的独特方法是必不可少的，因为日益增长的全球竞争和对新技术的日益重视推动了对创造性工程师的需求。这项研究的目标是塑造研究生教育的招聘，保留和工程培训的最佳实践，特别是对于工程博士生，但这项工作的要素将转移到研究生教育中的其他人群。通过对研究生动机目标设定与身份认同形成的混合研究，本研究将回答以下问题：1。什么是工程博士生的身份和动机概况，这是基于以前的学术和研究经验在干？2. STEM社区如何影响工程博士生的身份形成和动机目标设定过程？ 3.这些与身份形成和动机相关的过程如何影响工程研究生的保留，生产力和追求博士水平的工程职业？ 在最初的定量阶段，将完成一项调查的开发，管理和分析，以评估目前入学的工程研究生的全国代表性样本的经验。数据将使用先进的聚类技术进行分析，以创建反映研究生的身份和动机的态度概况。为了最大限度地扩大样本量，学生将通过工程学会和有针对性的招标招募到研究生工程项目。 在定性的第二阶段，将选择多达50名不同态度的学生来研究身份发展和动机目标设定的研究生经历的影响。使用现象学的透镜，学生将采访他们的经验，在研究生工程教育。通过混合方法的方法，学生的身份和动机的相互作用将被捕获，并如何学术经验影响这些配置文件将被确定。结果可用于通知研究生课程的方案决策，并促进促进动机和身份发展的干预措施。