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

该项目将有助于通过突出学术途径，并通过一组学位和训练有素的工人，黑人工程技术（ET）毕业生，谁经常被忽视在周围的对话陈述的多样性，公平和包容性的工程专业目标的大学更多样化的工程劳动力的发展。虽然ET毕业生经常与工程师一起工作，而且他们的入门级职位描述之间可能没有什么区别，但由于他们选择的学位道路，许多人在分层工程领域遇到了职业发展的障碍。此外，与工程学相比，一些工程技术专业的黑人学生人数过多，直接影响了黑人学生的人数 这些人后来拥有进入工程教授、工程研究职业和工业领导职位所需的学位证书。这项研究将集中在声音，经验，和黑人ET学生的知识，通过焦点小组访谈和调查，以深入了解导致他们选择的专业和他们的经验，黑人学生在ET的因素。该项目还将比较工程和ET计划在合作机构，并检查是否有某些工程专业，比其他人更难进入，以及黑人学生是否集中在一些ET专业比其他人。这项工作的总体目标是有助于识别和消除系统性和结构性障碍和种族不平等的ET本科教育。长期目标是，研究结果将被用于为干预措施和政策变化提供信息。调查为什么有一个不成比例的黑人学生比例在ET相比，工程将揭示复杂的社会地形，黑人学生必须导航，以打击教育的结构性障碍，以实现本科大学学位一般，和工程相关的学位，具体来说，与所有的专业利益学位授予。该项目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ET与工程学时扮演什么角色？2.影响黑人学生进入工程专业的学术和结构性障碍是什么？3.什么是结构性障碍和启示，使或阻止黑人学生从ET转移到工程（反之亦然）从本科课程？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，以及这与刻板印象威胁和对该计划的认同感的背景显着性有何关系？6.学生对他们在教育技术中的经历的感知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）相关？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轻其影响的解决方案，为培养更加多元化的STEM劳动力做出贡献。该合作项目由STEM教育计划中的种族平等（EDU Racial Equity）资助。该计划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。获奖项目旨在集中STEM企业内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。该计划符合NSF的核心价值观，即支持来自全国人口群体，地区和组织类型多样性的优秀研究人员和创新思想家。教育大学的各个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开发目标的一致性。该奖项反映了NSF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。

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.