Conference Session

Programmatic Design and Resiliency Among Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

hongyan miao, Union College; Elsie Mae Lewin Paxton, Union College; Jaqueline Nicole Anderson, Union College; Maia Chapin, Union College; Leza Sorn, Union College

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

Schenectady, NY 12308AbstractFemale representation in mechanical engineering remains a critical challenge for academicinstitutions committed to fostering diversity and inclusivity. At Union College, the genderdisparity is evident, with female enrollment in the Mechanical Engineering departmentdeclining from 22.5% in the freshman cohort to only 13.3% by senior year. To address thisgap, the department has introduced initiatives aimed at supporting and retaining femalestudents through structured mentorship, peer support, and career development programs.Key among these efforts is the Female Student Mentor Project, which pairs senior studentswith underclassmen to foster academic confidence and professional growth. Additionally,regular networking events

Conference Session

Programmatic Design and Resiliency Among Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jessica Baldis, University of California, San Diego; Alex M. Phan, University of California, San Diego; Jaclyn Duerr, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

[9][10]. Strong connections, fostered throughacademic, social, and extracurricular experiences, have been shown to improve both retentionand graduation rates. These activities offer students opportunities to build networks of faculty,peers, and advisors, which are essential to students' persistence and academic success [11][12].For women in STEM, proactive initiatives, programs, seminars, and workshops have been shownto integrate women into their academic departments more effectively [13] and help themnavigate the challenges of higher education. By fostering a sense of belonging and a strong socialnetwork, these experiences not only provide academic benefits but also boost students'confidence and motivation [14][15]. In addition, high-impact

Conference Session

First-Year and Experiential Learning for Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Madeline JoAnna Szoo, Northeastern University; Courtney Pfluger, Northeastern University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

outcomes in team settings. Mallette et al. explained that the pressureswomen faced to complete a greater proportion of the writing tasks than their male peers in ayear-long senior capstone materials science and engineering course was due to “the prevailingperception…that women are the strongest writers, so the writing should fall to them,” as well asthe personal desire by female students to produce high-quality project deliverables and theadoption of technical tasks as a way to avoid writing by male students [13]. While these writingcontributions, if visible and rewarded, are not inherently problematic, this task allocation practicemay limit female students’ opportunities to practice and build self-efficacy in technicalcompetencies, and writing

Conference Session

Engagement and Participation for Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Dustyn Roberts, University of Pennsylvania; Jessa Lingel, University of Pennsylvania

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

Education initiative and others demonstrates that NTT faculty arepaid 25% less than their TT peers while lacking the protections of tenure [3]. Recommendationsdictate that benefit packages offered to full-time NTT faculty should correspond to thoseavailable to TT faculty [3], [4], but a quick glance through most university websites shows this isoften not the case. Although many features of NTT faculty employment are problematic [5], ourfocus is on disparities around caregiving support - specifically parental leave and workload reliefpolicies.Despite their critical roles in teaching, mentoring, and research, NTT faculty are often excludedfrom benefits offered to TT faculty, including parental leave and workload relief policies. Thelack of equitable

Conference Session

Engagement and Participation for Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Lydia Prendergast, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Lorne S. Joseph, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Hayet Bensetti-Benbader, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

near-peer mentors,engaging in STEM focused events and activities, and connection to university and STEMresources.This practice paper reviews the history and evolution of STEM LLCs for women at RutgersUniversity and catalogs LLC practices, with a particular focus on community engagement. Alongitudinal graduation review of living-learning community participants is also provided,showing that an average of 80% of LLC students graduate in STEM.INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUNDIn the early 1900’s, the New Jersey State Federation of Women’s Clubs convinced Mabel SmithDouglass to lead the effort of establishing a women’s college as part of Rutgers University. In1918, the New Jersey College for Women, later named Douglass College, opened its doors to

Conference Session

Engagement and Participation for Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Andrea Lidia (Lili) Castillo, Arizona State University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

to be developed inductively. The final round of coding used axial coding, whichaims to center the coding around the most salient topics [22]. The researcher engaged incontinual peer debriefing and analytical memo writing to engage in reflexivity as they engagedwith the data in more profound ways [21]. The themes for this paper were determined during thefinal cycle of coding and aim to capture the most salient topics described by the participants.Any redactions or author's notes inserted for clarification are noted in italics and brackets. Thethemes are further explored in the findings section below.FindingsThis work-in-progress paper is focused on understanding four women’s motivations for joining aGI ESO and how their membership impacted

Conference Session

Systemic and Policy Issues affecting Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Angela R Bielefeldt, University of Colorado Boulder

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

opportunities. … But what really pushed me was when I was in high school and I realized that scientists were studying us. And basically … there were a lot of environmental justice activists that were coming out and shouting that we were dying. …. And then the University of [DEID] came to my high school to recruit for a study of the health impacts of these chemicals. …. But they never came back and told us what the results were at all. That fueled me. …. I would one day face those researchers that did that study in my hometown and then they were gonna have to answer [to me]. …when I landed in higher education at the Ivory Tower I wasn't ready …. So I had to work triple, quadruple more than a lot of my peers. …. I realized that my passion

Conference Session

Messaging, Motivations and Supports for Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Barbara E. Marino, Loyola Marymount University; Agnieszka Miguel, Seattle University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

Fellows to asupportive network of peers and professionals through assignment to an i2 mHub. Each i2 mHubwill consist of two to three iREDEFINE Fellows, one to two junior ECE faculty (iREDEFINEalumni), and one to two ECE academic leaders, such as current or former department chairs.Through structured virtual activities, Fellows actively applying for academic positions willreceive guidance from both junior and senior faculty within their Hub. This unique mentoringstructure also fosters a multi-level support system, where senior members provide mentorship tojunior faculty while encouraging peer mentoring among the iREDEFINE Fellows.2 BackgroundAccording to the latest U.S. Census, 50.5% of the U.S. population identifies as female 1

Conference Session

Programmatic Design and Resiliency Among Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Hilda Cecilia Contreras Aguirre, New Mexico State University; Ginger Scarbrough, WERC Environmental Design Contest, New Mexico State University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

analysis revealed that student leaders used communication, decision-making, vision, andpassion to lead their teams. In particular, there were differences between women and men leaderswhen it came to leading others; while men leaders used a relaxed and fun way to lead, womenadopted a more serious and rigorous approach in their leadership roles. Furthermore, womenleaders found it more difficult to lead their peers and still have a positive relationship with them,and continue their friendship. Overall, women leaders took advantage of their leadership role inincreasing their sense of belonging to engineering, acquiring technical skills, and expanding theirknowledge of what the engineering profession can look like. Women leaders also reportedhaving

Conference Session

First-Year and Experiential Learning for Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jiahui Song, Wentworth Institute of Technology; Gloria Guohua Ma, Wentworth Institute of Technology; Federica Aveta; Douglas Eric Dow, Wentworth Institute of Technology; Mary Machado; Xiu Zhai, Wentworth Institute of Technology

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

utilize sensors to 'see' their environment and adeptly navigateobstacles. Figure 3: mBot platform used in the workshop activities.The activity was divided into four different tasks to make sure students could independentlyprogress on the different tasks at their own pace. Hands out were provided with clear instructionson the steps and on how to use block coding to perform the required tasks. • Task 1 Start up!: The first activity consisted in connecting the mBot to the laptop via USB and connect it the desktop • Task 2 Obstacle Avoidance: Students started writing the code to enable mBot to move forward, to stop for 2 seconds when an obstacle was at distance less than 20 centimeters and move backwards

Conference Session

Programmatic Design and Resiliency Among Women Engineers

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jing Zhang, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; Hou Xie; Rosie Ruoci Shen, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; Valeri Werpetinski, University of Illinois Urbana - Champaign; Lawrence Angrave, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign; Yuting W. Chen, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

-disciplinary collaboration enabled us togain deeper insights into participants’ gendered experiences by integrating perspectives fromdifferent contexts, such as the workplace, academia, and personal life. Our shared commitmentto fostering a more inclusive work environment was driven by both personal and professionalmotivations.Two women graduate researchers in education and psychology were primarily responsible forthe study design, data collection, data analysis, and writing advised by engineering educationfaculty. Their internship experiences outside engineering helped them empathize withparticipants, while their academic backgrounds provided theoretical and methodologicalexperience to interpret gender equity issues. In addition, two members of the

Conference Session

Persistence, Outcomes and Barriers for Women in Engineering

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Lily Skau, Austin Peay State University; Emmabeth Parrish Vaughn, Austin Peay State University; Bobette Bouton; Steven Blake Warth, Austin Peay State University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering Division (WIED)

education a more socially just and safe space for all and uses writing, speaking, and research to address each of these important aspects of her academic career.Steven Blake Warth, Austin Peay State University ©American Society for Engineering Education, 2025 Retrospective Insights in Choosing a Career in Engineering Abstract Women have historically been underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields [1]. The gender gap in participation in engineering remains especially large, and the cause of this gap is the question of many researchers [2],[3],[4]. Research teams have found that perceptions of the