The Influence of Out-of-school High School Experiences on Engineering Identities and Career Choice

Godwin, Allison; Sonnert, Gerhard; Sadler, Philip M.

doi:10.18260/p.24889

Cited by 7 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…Prior work has shown that developing math-and science-related identities and developing motivation to accomplish far-off goals are important attributes for students choosing and wishing to persist in engineering fields (Godwin, Potvin, Hazari, & Lock, 2016). This work is an extension of a prior study examining how students' out-of-school experiences predicted engineering identity at the beginning of college, future engineering certainty, and gender differences to further explore how interests in STEM-related activities before college can impact disciplinary engineering choice (Godwin, Sonnert, & Sadler, 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 90%

Disciplinary Differences in Out-of-School High School Science Experiences and Influence on Students’ Engineering Choices

Godwin¹,

Sonnert²,

Sadler³

2017

Journal of Pre-College Engineering Education Research (J-PEER)

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Participation from a variety of students is important to the long-term growth of the engineering field. Much of the research on engineering recruitment or career choice has focused on engineering as a whole, even though engineering disciplines are varied in student participation and focus. This work examines how students' out-of-school interests and experiences in high school predict the likelihood of choosing a career in a particular engineering discipline. Out-of-school experiences offer more unstructured ways for students to meaningfully engage with science and engineering outside of the confines of the classroom. These experiences offer opportunities to spark particular science interests not included in traditional high school science curriculum. Additionally, participation in engineering for women has been historically low. For this reason, we also examined reported differences in out-of-school experiences by gender. Our findings indicate that reported out-of-school experiences increased the odds of students choosing particular engineering disciplines. Experiences traditionally stereotyped as masculine and more often reported by men, such as tinkering, increased the odds of choosing engineering disciplines with higher representation of men. However, some experiences equally reported by men and women, such as mixing chemicals or engaging with chemistry in the kitchen or talking with friends or family about science, predicted higher odds of choosing engineering disciplines with higher representation of women (chemical, biomedical, environmental). These quantitative results are a first step in understanding how out-of-school experiences are connected to the nuanced decisions of disciplinary engineering career decisions and have implications for the way engineering faculty draw on prior experience in the classrooms and for researchers on how out-of-school activities may predict students' long-term career decisions.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 90%

Disciplinary Differences in Out-of-School High School Science Experiences and Influence on Students’ Engineering Choices

Godwin¹,

Sonnert²,

Sadler³

2017

Journal of Pre-College Engineering Education Research (J-PEER)

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Additional work has been conducted to expand this original quantitative instrument to measure math and science identities [18][19][20] . The physics and math measures have been used in several large-scale, nationally representative studies to understand the impact of these identities on students' choice of a STEM major in college 18,19,[21][22][23] .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Development of a Measure of Engineering Identity

Godwin

2016 ASEE Annual Conference &Amp; Exposition Proceedings

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220

275

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This research paper describes the recent development of items to measure post-secondary students' engineering identity. Engineering identity is a particular type of role identity that students author during their experiences in engineering, typically in college. This paper draws upon a subject-related role identity framework that focuses on students self-beliefs of their interest, performance/competence, and recognition within engineering. First, a pilot survey of 371 first-year engineering students was conducted at three institutions in the U.S. during the spring semester of 2015. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was performed to examine the underlying structure of the piloted questions about students' engineering identity. The developed items were used in a subsequent study deployed in the fall semester of 2015 that measured more than 2500 first-year engineering students' attitudes and beliefs at four institutions in the U.S. The data on engineering identity measures from this second survey were analyzed using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). The results indicated that the developed measures do extract a significant portion of the average variance in the latent constructs and the internal consistency of the measures (Cronbach's α) fell within the acceptable and better range. The development of these items provides new measures for engineering education researchers to more deeply explore the underlying self-beliefs in students' engineering identity formation.

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“…Additionally, work by Kang, Calabrese Barton, Tan, Simpkins, Rhee and Turner [38] investigated the factors that influence middle school girls of color engineering identity, and identified out-of-school and home experiences as an important influence on engineering identity development for girls of color. Finally, from a survey of approximately 15,000 college freshman (including both engineering students and non-engineering students), participation in STEM clubs, camps, and groups was found to significantly predict a students' perception of themselves as an engineer at the time but that does not necessarily translate to their future perception [36].…”

Section: Engineering Identity In Informal Settingsmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…Several articles were identified regarding engineering identity development outside of the classroom (e.g. [9], [36], [37], [38]). STEM camps are the most common experience discussed, but after-school STEM clubs or programs and STEM hobbies are also discussed in the literature.…”

Section: Engineering Identity In Informal Settingsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Additionally, other articles included informal programs, like camps, as a factor in identity development (e.g. [36], [38]). Hughes, Nzekwe and Molyneaux [9] investigated two camps offered by a national laboratory for middle school students, one coeducational and one all-girl camp, focusing on the effect of these camps on girls' identity development.…”

Section: Engineering Identity In Informal Settingsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Engineering Identity in Pre-College Students: A Literature Review

Clark¹,

Kajfez²

2019 ASEE Annual Conference &Amp; Exposition Proceedings

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is currently a Ph.D. student in the Department of Engineering Education at The Ohio State University. She is currently advised by Dr. Rachel Kajfez, and is part of the RIME collaborative (https://u.osu.edu/rimetime). Her research interests include engineering identity development in K12 students, engineering education in informal settings, and women's experiences in the engineering field. Prior to coming to Ohio State, Abigail worked as a researcher at Battelle Memorial Institute in Columbus, OH. She holds a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Ohio Northern University.

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The Influence of Out-of-school High School Experiences on Engineering Identities and Career Choice

Cited by 7 publications

References 26 publications

Disciplinary Differences in Out-of-School High School Science Experiences and Influence on Students’ Engineering Choices

Disciplinary Differences in Out-of-School High School Science Experiences and Influence on Students’ Engineering Choices

The Development of a Measure of Engineering Identity

Engineering Identity in Pre-College Students: A Literature Review

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