Conference Session

Life After Graduation

Collection

2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Houshang Darabi, University of Illinois, Chicago; Elnaz Douzali, University of Illinois, Chicago; Fazle Shahnawaz Muhibul Karim, University of Illinois, Chicago; Samuel Thomas Harford, University of Illinois, Chicago, PROMINENT Labs; Hereford Johnson, University of Illinois, Chicago

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

that programsmeet and surpass the standards necessary for technical fields; and that programs are “leading theway in innovation, emerging technologies and anticipating the welfare and safety needs of thepublic”9. One of many papers written that discusses the designing and teaching of courses tosatisfy ABET regulations was presented by Richard M. Felder and Rebecca Brent10. Topics suchas ethics and technical skills are readily available, but there is room for growth in the area of lifeand soft skills for engineering graduates. As far back as 1998 where Duyen Q. Nguyen wrotethat engineering careers remain technical but are shifting towards soft-engineering due to themultidisciplinary nature of the changing workplace11. The two areas he included

Conference Session

Graduate Education

Collection

2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Erika Mosyjowski, University of Michigan; Shanna R. Daly, University of Michigan; Diane L. Peters, Kettering University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

interpersonal skills he developed in his previouscareer helped him in his academic work, describing himself as “much more people-based” thanhe had been prior to working, and explained he felt that relationships with others was key tosuccess. However, he contrasted these benefits of his time working with the challenges ofadapting to the academic rigor of a PhD program: I see people that are coming in but also unsure where they want to work […] and they can struggle a little bit because of that. My work experience helped me in terms of that. It's all the soft skills, the external skills, because you get hurt more on the academic side. It's much harder academically, but it's easier in terms of motivation, managing, and stuff like

Conference Session

Retention

Collection

2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Niranjan Hemant Desai, Purdue University Northwest; George Stefanek, Purdue University Northwest

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods