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From Barriers to Bridges: A Case Study on Engineering Education

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Conference

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Location

Montreal, Quebec, Canada

Publication Date

June 22, 2025

Start Date

June 22, 2025

End Date

August 15, 2025

Conference Session

Minorities in Engineering Division(MIND) Technical Session 6

Tagged Division

Minorities in Engineering Division(MIND)

Tagged Topic

Diversity

Page Count

20

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/56602

Paper Authors

biography

Colten Van Voorhis Texas A&M University - Commerce

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Colten Van Voorhis is a Master's student at East Texas A&M University and a Graduate Research Assistant in the Computer Science Department. My research interests include cybersecurity, autonomous driving, user privacy, and STEM diversity equity efforts.

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biography

Yuehua Wang Texas A&M University - Commerce

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Dr. Yuehua Wang is an Associate Professor of CS. Her research interests are software programming and engineering, autonomous driving, artificial intelligence, vehicular sensing and control, vehicle communication systems, resource virtualization, cyber-physical systems, Internet of Things, ubiquitous and mobile computing, wireless and mobile networks, and distributed networks and systems. She has more than ten years of research experience in academia with over twenty research publications and open-source software packages with rich programming and project development experience. She has mentored and worked closely with minority undergraduate students. She has also continuously devoted herself to advertising engineering and computer science programs and reaching out to historically underserved populations.

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Abstract

BIPOC students remain underrepresented in undergraduate engineering programs despite decades of effort that have been contributed to promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion in STEM education. From 2013 to 2022, the percentage of White K-12 students in Texas has decreased from 30.66% to 26.74%. Meanwhile, the Hispanic/Latino student population has increased from 50.17% to 52.36%. The percentage of Black or African American students has remained almost consistent, going from 12.50% to 12.65%. Additionally, the population of students identifying as two or more races has increased from 1.78% to 2.89%, and the population of Asian students has increased from 3.65% to 4.68%. Compared to national enrollment by year, we found lower percentages of Black or African American and Asian students in Texas. In particular, Texas had a significantly smaller population of Black or African American female students than the US (7.57% in 2013 and 7.37% in 2022), with only 6.61% in Texas and 6.20% in 2022. This indicates a significant disparity between gender representation in K-12 and engineering education. This finding is distressing and shows that there may be reasons deterring females from seeking engineering degrees. In this paper, we collect data and conduct a detailed case study by closely examining the national, state, and university data on Engineering education (including enrollment and completion). We are dedicated to identifying the primary factors and barriers influencing the education of BIPOC and female students in the field of Engineering by using machine learning based on the collected data. Finally, the results, challenges, and future trends/efforts are discussed. The findings from this paper are shared and provided to reduce barriers and promote engineering education.

Van Voorhis, C., & Wang, Y. (2025, June), From Barriers to Bridges: A Case Study on Engineering Education Paper presented at 2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition , Montreal, Quebec, Canada . https://peer.asee.org/56602

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