Collaborative Research: Gateway or Gatekeeper: Understanding Why Black Students Choose Engineering Technology or Engineering, and the Implications of this Choice

合作研究：门户还是看门人：了解黑人学生为何选择工程技术或工程，以及这一选择的含义

• 批准号: 2224767
• 负责人: Anne Lucietto
• 金额: $ 29.24万
• 依托单位: Purdue University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-06-01 至 2026-05-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2224767&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Gateway; Gatekeeper; Understanding

This project will contribute to the development of a more diverse engineering workforce by highlighting the academic pathways to and through college of a group of degreed and trained workers, Black Engineering Technology (ET) graduates, who are often overlooked in conversations around the stated diversity, equity, and inclusion goals for the Engineering profession. While ET graduates often work alongside engineers and there may be little distinction between their entry-level job descriptions, many encounter barriers to career advancement in the hierarchical engineering field because of their chosen degree path. In addition, the disproportionately large number of Black students in some engineering technology programs compared to engineering directly impacts the number of Black students who later have the degree credentials often required to enter to the engineering professorate, engineering research careers, and leadership positions in industry. This study will center on the voices, experiences, and knowledge of Black ET students through focus group interviews and surveys in order to gain insight into the factors that led them to their chosen major and their experiences as Black students in ET. The project will also compare the engineering and ET programs at the collaborating institutions and examine whether there are certain engineering majors that are less accessible than others, and whether Black students are concentrated in some ET majors more than others.The overarching goal of this work is to contribute to the identification and removal of systemic and structural barriers and racial inequities in ET undergraduate education. The long-term goal is that the findings of the research will be used to inform interventions and policy changes. Investigating the reasons why there is a disproportionately high percentage of Black students in ET compared to engineering will shed light on the complex social terrain that Black students must navigate to combat the structural barriers in education to achieve an undergraduate college degree generally, and an engineering-related degree specifically, with all of the professional benefits a degree confers. The specific research questions of the project are as follows: 1. What role do high school counselors, college counselors/recruiters, and faculty play in Black students’ choice of ET versus engineering? 2. What are the academic and structural barriers that effect Black students’ admittance to engineering? 3. What are the structural barriers and affordances that enable or prevent Black students to transfer from ET to engineering (and vice versa) from during an undergraduate program? 4. How do Black ET students perceive their future career opportunities? 5. To what extent do Black ET students identify with the Engineering and/or ET domain and how is this related to contextual salience of stereotype threat and belongingness to the program? 6. How do students’ perceptions of their experiences in ET and the interpretation of these experiences relate to their self-schemas including their expectations of success, personal, cultural, and professional identities, and their career goals? This project will contribute to efforts to develop a more diverse STEM workforce by examining how these complexities influence student choice of major and suggesting solutions to lessen their impacts.This collaborative project is funded through the Racial Equity in STEM Education program (EDU Racial Equity). The program supports research and practice projects that investigate how considerations of racial equity factor into the improvement of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education and workforce. Awarded projects seek to center the voices, knowledge, and experiences of the individuals, communities, and institutions most impacted by systemic inequities within the STEM enterprise. This program aligns with NSF’s core value of supporting outstanding researchers and innovative thinkers from across the Nation's diversity of demographic groups, regions, and types of organizations. Programs across EDU contribute funds to the Racial Equity program in recognition of the alignment of its projects with the collective research and development thrusts of the four divisions of the directorate.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

该项目将通过强调一群拥有学位和训练有素的工人，黑人工程技术（ET）毕业生进入大学的学术途径，为更多元化的工程劳动力的发展做出贡献，黑人工程技术（ET）毕业生在围绕工程专业所述的多样性、公平和包容性目标的对话中经常被忽视。虽然工程技术毕业生经常与工程师一起工作，而且他们的入门级工作描述之间可能没有什么区别，但由于他们选择的学位路径，许多人在分层工程领域遇到了职业发展的障碍。此外，与工程专业相比，一些工程技术专业的黑人学生数量不成比例，这直接影响了后来获得学位证书的黑人学生的数量，这些证书通常是进入工程教授、工程研究职业和工业领导职位所必需的。本研究将通过焦点小组访谈和调查来关注黑人ET学生的声音、经历和知识，以深入了解导致他们选择专业的因素以及他们作为黑人ET学生的经历。该项目还将比较合作机构的工程和ET项目，并检查是否存在某些工程专业比其他专业更难进入的情况。以及黑人学生是否更集中于某些电子商务专业。这项工作的总体目标是有助于识别和消除在ET本科教育中的系统性和结构性障碍和种族不平等。长期目标是，研究结果将用于为干预措施和政策变化提供信息。调查为什么与工程专业相比，学习工程专业的黑人学生比例高得不成比例的原因，将揭示出黑人学生必须克服教育中的结构性障碍才能获得本科学位的复杂社会环境，特别是获得与工程相关的学位，并获得学位所带来的所有专业好处。本课题的具体研究问题如下：1。高中辅导员、大学辅导员/招聘人员和教师在黑人学生选择理工与工程方面发挥了什么作用？2. 影响黑人学生进入工程专业的学术和结构障碍是什么？3. 在本科阶段，有哪些结构性障碍和支持能够或阻止黑人学生从理工学院转到工程学院（反之亦然）？4. 黑人ET学生如何看待他们未来的职业机会？5. 黑人ET学生在多大程度上认同工程和/或ET领域，这与刻板印象威胁的背景突出性和对项目的归属感有什么关系？6. 学生对他们的教育经历的看法和对这些经历的解释如何与他们的自我图式（包括他们对成功的期望、个人、文化和职业身份以及他们的职业目标）联系起来？该项目将通过研究这些复杂性如何影响学生的专业选择，并提出减少其影响的解决方案，为培养更加多样化的STEM劳动力做出贡献。该合作项目由STEM教育项目中的种族平等（EDU种族平等）资助。该项目支持研究和实践项目，调查种族平等因素如何影响科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）教育和劳动力的改善。获奖项目旨在将STEM企业中受系统性不平等影响最大的个人、社区和机构的声音、知识和经验集中起来。该项目符合美国国家科学基金会的核心价值，即支持来自全国不同人口群体、地区和组织类型的杰出研究人员和创新思想家。EDU的项目为种族平等项目提供资金，以表彰其项目与董事会四个部门的集体研究和发展重点相一致。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。