Conference Session

WIED: Faculty and Gender Issues

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Sharon Patricia Mason, Rochester Institute of Technology; Carol Elizabeth Marchetti, Rochester Institute of Technology (COE); Margaret B. Bailey, Rochester Institute of Technology (COE); Stefi Alison Baum, Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science, Rochester Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

career stages.14-16 St. Rose and her co-authors Catherine Hill, AmericanAssociation of University Women’s director of research, and Christianne Corbette, a researchassociate examined hundreds of studies and identified “eight factors that helped depress thenumbers of girls and women in STEM: beliefs about intelligence, stereotypes, self-assessment,spatial skills, the college student experience, university and college faculty, implicit bias, andworkplace bias.”17These factors manifest themselves in the fact that women are less likely to indicate an intentionto major in a STEM field. Despite the fact that girls and boys take math and science courses inroughly equal numbers during pre-university schooling, by the time they graduate college,women are

Conference Session

WIED: Pre-College Student Experiences

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Amanda S. Parker, University of Colorado Boulder; Beth A. Myers, University of Colorado Boulder; Jacquelyn F. Sullivan, University of Colorado Boulder

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

influential” in their decisions to attend the CEAS (Table 2).As the number of women who attended Girls Explore Engineering Day increased in 2013, so didthe program’s effectiveness. Of the women who attended in 2013, 93% found it to be somewhator very influential in their decisions to attend the CEAS, while in 2012, only 40% of attendeesreported this degree of influence, as shown in Figure 2. Why the improvements? The 2013program provided tours of labs in disciplines that women are typically more interested in, andmore staff and student volunteers were made available for one-on-one chats with both studentsand parents. And, with the addition of the parent track, this event became more personal andsocially engaging. Many staff members commented that

Conference Session

WIED: Faculty and Gender Issues

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Cheryl Cass, North Carolina State University; Lisa G. Bullard, North Carolina State University; Anita R. Vila-Parrish, North Carolina State University

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

adiscussion of best practices for NTT faculty career development and promotion in Fall2011. Promotional policies that have already been adopted at the University level will bediscussed, including those related to letters of support, expectations for national and internationalvisibility, and department voting. Future work at NCSU will focus on NTT faculty careerenrichment in addition to the development of more standard procedures for recognizing andevaluating the external impact of research, teaching, and outreach efforts of NTT faculty.Experiences of Women Faculty in STEMThere has been a renewed focus on exploring gender differences in academia. While increases infemale graduate students have occurred at the doctorate level, this has not translated

Conference Session

WIED: Medley

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Keith J. Bowman, Illinois Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

ofwomen than their representation as undergrads may be having a positive impact on PhDattainment. This suggests that further study of ECE-specific URE programs might be warranted.Relative to the BS level, PhD programs are strongly impacted by recruiting, candidate screening Page 24.604.9and financial support controlled by departments and individual faculty (Fox, 2000, Bowman,2014). ECE programs and individual faculty have independent control over recruiting andmentoring graduate students in their research groups as they do for URE students. The recentgrowth in female doctoral attainment, particularly for domestic ECE students, is an area ripe

Conference Session

WIED: Curricular Undergraduate Student Programs

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Kristen B. Coletti, Northeastern University; Emily Olina Wisniewski; Rachel Lauren Shapiro, Northeastern University; Paul A. DiMilla, Northeastern University; Rachelle Reisberg, Northeastern University; Melinda Covert, Northeastern University

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

faculty member. These results suggested that the closer ineducational background a supplemental instructor was to the student, the more comfortable thestudent felt using that person as a resource. Results from last year’s survey also indicated thatstudents felt being able to explain the material well was the most important quality for a tutor to Page 24.323.3have, with the depth of understanding as the second most important quality. The least importantquality reported by both male and female students before and after taking the course wasempathy. Availability and friendliness, both before and after taking the course, had similarlevels of

Conference Session

WIED: Strategies Beyond the Classroom

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Kerry Meyers, Youngstown State University; Leo H. McWilliams, University of Notre Dame; Catherine F. Pieronek, University of Notre Dame

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

that those students who are involved inengineering organizations are also involved in other on-campus organizations (0.85). Grade-point average was moderately correlated with considering leaving engineering (-0.37), but notwith plans to work in an engineering-related field post-graduation (0.03). These relationshipswere explored further and are discussed in the following sections, which also include a summaryof the survey response rates for specific questions with emphasis on gender and race/ethnicity(white vs. non-white). It continues with a presentation of statistically significant variablerelationships (t-tests and chi-square) and continues with identification of statistically significantfactors from regression modeling, in which tests of

Conference Session

WIED: Medley

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jane L. Lehr, California Polytechnic State University; Helene Finger P.E., California Polytechnic State University; Alana Christine Snelling

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

engineering as a major, 3) how the students made their decisions about education, and 4)who the students are and how their identities compare to dominant images of what it means to bean engineer. This research is most immediately relevant to CPSU as an institution, however, thedata allow for exploration of what attracts some students to engineering, and therefore maysuggest strategies for recruitment of female and male undergraduate students in engineering atthis and other institutions, as well as additional research questions focused on studentmotivations and understandings of engineering as a discipline in pre-collegiate contexts. Thispaper reports on two years of survey data (2011 and 2013).MethodologyThis research project is survey based and was

Conference Session

WIED: Strategies Beyond the Classroom

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Cate Samuelson, University of Washington; Elizabeth Litzler, University of Washington; Candice L. Staples, University of Maryland; Paige E. Smith, University of Maryland, College Park; Catherine T. Amelink, Virginia Tech

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

with similarities such as age, gender, major, andacademic abilities. Through a LLC community, students are able to encourage one anotherduring difficult classes and help each other gain a deeper understanding of classroom concepts.20This type of peer-to-peer interaction provides assistance with students’ academic and socialintegration. Unfortunately, an unintended consequence can be the formation of cliques, orsmaller communities within the already small community.The environment of certain LLCs also encourages other types of non-peer interaction. Facultyand staff members can be involved in activities for a LLC, thereby increasing students’ comfortlevel interacting with them. Research has shown that interactions between students and faculty