Girls Experiencing Engineering: Evolution and Impact of a Single-Gender Outreach Program

Abstract

Engineering, is currently involved in several engineering and STEM education projects. She is part of the project team for the NSF funded MemphiSTEP: A STEM Talent Expansion Program (NSF DUE 0756738), where her responsibilities include coordination of the entire project's mentoring activities, including the peer-mentoring, peer-tutoring, and STEM club mini-grant program. She is leading a project focused on service learning within the Civil Engineering curriculum and a project examining links between learning styles and freshman attrition from engineering programs. Dr. Ivey et al. received the 2005 Best Research Paper award from the ASEE Midwest Section, and the 2006 award from ASEE Zone III for the preliminary publication from the learning style project. She teaches courses in transportation engineering and engineering statistics and conducts research in the area of sustainable community development and freight modeling. She is a lead faculty instructor for the Herff College of Engineering's targeted outreach program, Girls Experiencing Engineering, since its inception in 2004, and has also served as program faculty in other coeducational outreach programs. She has experience as a high-school math/science teacher, is the faculty advisor for the UM Institute of Transportation Engineers student chapter, and holds a local office with ASCE.

Attracting Students to Transportation Engineering

“…Additional focus sessions for high school students (designed to include more in-depth focus on specific engineering disciplines in 2-day blocks, with a leadership session on the final day of the program week) were added in 2006, and a parent orientation session was introduced in 2008. Further details regarding the GEE program evolution and evaluation are available in other publications (14,15).…”

“…These studies also indicate that parental influence is a more important decision-making factor for female versus male students. Mentoring and role models are also important influencing factors for major and career selection (9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20).…”

“…Summer programs are even more critical for female and minority students, because they provide the first exposure to STEM career opportunities for many of these students, and mentoring in this setting can be very effective (23)(24)(25). Experience from previous programs demonstrates the difficulties inherent in defining program impact simply by tracking the number of students that pursue a STEM major (15,25,26). Secondary students are still making decisions about career paths, making program assessment of declared interests and intended majors uncertain.…”

“…Maintaining contact with students until high school graduation so that final major selection can be determined is also challenging. Therefore, the definition of program impact should also include knowledge gains in both academic subject areas as well as career opportunities, along with shifts in attitudes and perceptions about STEM fields (15,(25)(26)(27).…”

“…It is also important to understand the themes and subareas within transportation engineering that may be most effective for recruiting students into transportation-related fields (particularly for students from underrepresented populations), as well as motivating factors and barriers that students perceive to majors in the field. In addition, considerable thought must be given to program delivery so that activities are engaging, at an appropriate pace, and interesting to students (15,28). Thus assessment of the TREC program was designed to illicit this information from student participants.…”