Jimenez, M. A., & Guillemard, L., & Santiago-Roman, A. I., & Santiago, N. G., & Quintero, P. O., & Lopez Del Puerto, C., & Cardona-Martinez, N., & Bartolomei-Suarez, S. M. (2023, June), Boosting Study Program Awareness via a Structured Introductory Experience to Engineering  Paper presented at 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland. 10.18260/1-2--43017

\bibitem{asee_peer_43017}
  Jimenez, M. A., \& Guillemard, L., \& Santiago-Roman, A. I., \& Santiago, N. G., \& Quintero, P. O., \& Lopez Del Puerto, C., \& Cardona-Martinez, N., \& Bartolomei-Suarez, S. M. (2023, June), \emph{Boosting Study Program Awareness via a Structured Introductory Experience to Engineering}
  Paper presented at 2023 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland.
  10.18260/1-2--43017

Manuel A. Jimenez, Luisa Guillemard, Aidsa I. Santiago-Roman, Nayda G. Santiago P.E., Pedro O. Quintero, Carla Lopez Del Puerto, Nelson Cardona-Martinez, and Sonia M. Bartolomei-Suarez.  "Boosting Study Program Awareness via a Structured Introductory Experience to Engineering".  2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland, 2023, June.  ASEE Conferences, 2023.  https://peer.asee.org/43017 Internet.  15 Dec, 2024

\bibitem{asee_peer_43017}
  Manuel A. Jimenez, Luisa Guillemard, Aidsa I. Santiago-Roman, Nayda G. Santiago P.E., Pedro O. Quintero, Carla Lopez Del Puerto, Nelson Cardona-Martinez, and Sonia M. Bartolomei-Suarez.
  "Boosting Study Program Awareness via a Structured Introductory Experience to Engineering".
  \emph{2023 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland, 2023, June}.
  ASEE Conferences, 2023.
  https://peer.asee.org/43017 Internet.  15 Dec, 2024

@INPROCEEDINGS{asee_peer_43017
author = "Manuel A. Jimenez, Luisa Guillemard, Aidsa I. Santiago-Roman, Nayda G. Santiago P.E., Pedro O. Quintero, Carla Lopez Del Puerto, Nelson Cardona-Martinez, and Sonia M. Bartolomei-Suarez"
title = "Boosting Study Program Awareness via a Structured Introductory Experience to Engineering"
booktitle = "2023 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition"
year = "2023"
month = "June"
address = "Baltimore , Maryland"
publisher = "ASEE Conferences"
note = {https://peer.asee.org/43017}
number = {10.18260/1-2--43017}
}

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - The experiences accumulated by students during their first year in college have a lasting impact on the rest of their academic lives.   In particular, their sense of belonging to a study program and institution as well as their self-efficacy perceptions have been identified as crucial factors during this period.  Both these factors are affected by the awareness these students develop about their chosen field of study. This is particularly true in institutions where students enter since their first year in a specific major.  We report on our experience of boosting study program awareness via a structured introductory experience to engineering in a Hispanic serving institution (HSI).
An assessment of the reasons reported by first- and second-year students in the host institution for choosing an engineering major denotes a wide range of responses.  Parent or relatives’ influence, expected salaries, and curiosity were among the most common reasons reported. Surprisingly, less than three percent responses pointed to career or vocational assessment tests, professional orientation, or academic related interventions as determinant factors. Moreover, when asked about the kind of jobs they understood were performed by engineers in their chosen fields of study, a large proportion of respondents denoted incongruity and narrow view of the role of engineers in their responses.  This mismatch is considered to be a reason for the observed number of early program transfers applications, low academic performance, and late attrition among students.
In an attempt to address the low perceived level of awareness about engineering, the <> introduced a pilot one-credit Introduction to Engineering course for first- and second-year students. <> is a college-wide initiative that seeks to increase success statistics among low-income, academically talented students (LIATS) in the College of Engineering (CoE). It incorporates multiple strategies that include talks and workshops, faculty and peer mentoring, and career planning among others. The insertion of this course tries to answer the question of how the early provision of career information and awareness impact the engineering retention and persistence of students and their interest in their chosen majors.
Introduction to engineering is structured to provide students with knowledge about the roles of engineers, the engineering method, ethics, team working, and detailed information about each of the engineering majors offered in the host institution CoE.  It also incorporates a hands-on, cross disciplinary team project that allows for students to use science and math to design a solution for a simple problem and to develop a prototype solution to test the accuracy of their designs. Through this experience, they not only put in practice the engineering method, but also begin to cultivate their soft skills while learning about the roles of engineers in their own and other majors.  Results of over three years of offering this course show encouraging trends. Increases of more than 30% in awareness indicators, career choice reassurance, and knowledge about their chosen major are among salient indicators.  This paper discusses the course structure, context of implementation, metrics, and preliminary results measured via descriptive statistics among participant students.
AU  - Manuel A. Jimenez
AU  - Luisa Guillemard
AU  - Aidsa I. Santiago-Roman
AU  - Nayda G. Santiago P.E.
AU  - Pedro O. Quintero
AU  - Carla Lopez Del Puerto
AU  - Nelson Cardona-Martinez
AU  - Sonia M. Bartolomei-Suarez
CY  - Baltimore , Maryland
DA  - 2023/06/25
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Boosting Study Program Awareness via a Structured Introductory Experience to Engineering
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/43017
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--43017
ER  -