Cromley, J., & Mirabelli, J., & Jensen, K. (2022, August), RFE: Understanding graduate engineering student well-being for prediction of retention: Year 1  Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN. 10.18260/1-2--42020

\bibitem{asee_peer_42020}
  Cromley, J., \& Mirabelli, J., \& Jensen, K. (2022, August), \emph{RFE: Understanding graduate engineering student well-being for prediction of retention: Year 1}
  Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Minneapolis, MN.
  10.18260/1-2--42020

Jennifer Cromley, Joseph Mirabelli, and Karin Jensen.  "RFE: Understanding graduate engineering student well-being for prediction of retention: Year 1".  2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN, 2022, August.  ASEE Conferences, 2022.  https://peer.asee.org/42020 Internet.  25 Apr, 2024

\bibitem{asee_peer_42020}
  Jennifer Cromley, Joseph Mirabelli, and Karin Jensen.
  "RFE: Understanding graduate engineering student well-being for prediction of retention: Year 1".
  \emph{2022 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Minneapolis, MN, 2022, August}.
  ASEE Conferences, 2022.
  https://peer.asee.org/42020 Internet.  25 Apr, 2024

@INPROCEEDINGS{asee_peer_42020
author = "Jennifer Cromley, Joseph Mirabelli, and Karin Jensen"
title = "RFE: Understanding graduate engineering student well-being for prediction of retention: Year 1"
booktitle = "2022 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition"
year = "2022"
month = "August"
address = "Minneapolis, MN"
publisher = "ASEE Conferences"
note = {https://peer.asee.org/42020}
number = {10.18260/1-2--42020}
}

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - Stress and Anxiety among Graduate Engineering Students: Report from the First Year
Recent research and news coverage suggest that anxiety has been increasing in postsecondary
education; doctoral engineering is no exception to this trend. In the first year of our 3‐year RFE
project, we interviewed doctoral engineering students and will use the results to create and validate
a questionnaire, and use results to predict intention to remain in a PhD program. In October 2021
we completed 55 interviews of ~1 hour, purposively sampling from large/medium/small
departments; domestic and international; male, female, and non‐binary; early/middle/late stage of
PhD program; and from minoritized and historically over‐represented groups. Interviews focused on
doctoral stressors and coping strategies; the protocol began with questions about living/family, then
about coursework, paid work, lab, and advisor stressors and coping strategies for those stressors.
Simultaneously, we began administering monthly questionnaires on stress, anxiety, and intention to
remain in engineering.
Emerging interview themes concern 3 novel and 4 previously‐reported stressors:
Novel: Travel‐related stressors for international students. International students spoke of stressors
from being unable to travel to or from home (due to travel bans or restrictions, difficulty getting
flights, visa problems, and/or COVID‐19 outbreaks). Both the uncertainty of future plans and
homesickness related to being unable to be in person with family were noted as major stressors for
many international students.
Novel: Tensions between teaching and lab responsibilities. Participants spoke of how research and
teaching demands often competed; this is often described as role conflict in the workplace stress
literature. The fact that different faculty supervise a single student for these two different jobs may
contribute to role conflict for doctoral students.
Novel: Importance of a car. Participants who did not have use of a car more often spoke of difficulty
making friends and connecting with friends, compared to those with a car. They also spoke of tradeoffs
between the time needed to access less‐expensive but more distant large grocery stores and the
easier access to more‐expensive but less well‐stocked nearby stores.
Previously‐reported: Work‐life balance. Participants spoke of labs that put extreme hourly demands
on students, such as never observing university holidays, 60‐hour work‐weeks, lengthy data
collection windows, little vacation time, and conflicts between family or partners as a consequence
of working hours or irritability from stresses at work.
Previously‐reported: Friction with advisors. Participants spoke of challenges with advising
relationships, including challenges in receiving feedback from advisors, pressure to take part in
projects of less interest to participants, differences in desired and actual advising styles, and
demanding weekly expectations.
Previously‐reported: Microaggressions. Participants spoke of being publicly, rudely criticized around
their race and around being a parent. These microaggressions occurred on campus, in departments,
and in the surrounding community.
Previously‐reported: Uneven Quality in Courses Taken. Students noted some uneven quality in the
teaching they receive, such as whether course materials were well‐organized, faculty gave clear
explanations, and assignments were aligned with stated course objectives. Some participants
attributed this to the switch to mostly online courses from March 2020 through May 2021.
AU  - Jennifer Cromley
AU  - Joseph Mirabelli
AU  - Karin Jensen
CY  - Minneapolis, MN
DA  - 2022/08/23
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - RFE: Understanding graduate engineering student well-being for prediction of retention: Year 1
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/42020
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--42020
ER  -