Take this Job and Love It: Identity-Conscious Self-Reflection as a Tool to Support Individualized Career Exploration for Graduating Biomedical Engineering Students

Uri Feldman; George D. Ricco; Catlin Wells

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Conference: 2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Portland, Oregon
Publication Date: June 23, 2024
Start Date: June 23, 2024
End Date: July 12, 2024
Conference Session: Biomedical Engineering Division (BED) Technical Session 1
Tagged Division: Biomedical Engineering Division (BED)
Tagged Topic: Diversity
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/48052

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Paper Authors

biography

Uri Feldman Wentworth Institute of Technology orcid.org/0000-0002-2986-748X

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Uri Feldman is an Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering in the School of Engineering at Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston. He received a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Media Lab, a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, and an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. As a Postdoctoral Fellow at Harvard Medical School at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Dr. Feldman developed informatics metrics to quantify performance of clinicians when using digital diagnostic tools. He has published in Radiology, Academic Radiology, IS&T, SPIE, and RESNA. As a Latino and native Spanish speaker, born in Peru, Dr. Feldman has created markets and commercialized innovative telemedicine products in Latin America for medical device companies, including Orex Computed Radiography, Kodak Health Group, and ICRco. Dr. Feldman also served as Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Boston Healthcare for the Homeless Program where he led the strategic planning and migration to EPIC Electronic Health Records system and novel meaningful use implementations through the Massachusetts Health Information Exchange. At Wentworth, Dr. Feldman is focused on project-based instruction, hands-on simulations, experiential learning approaches, and first year curriculum. Dr. Feldman is one of the lead instructors for Introduction to Engineering courses, with enrollments in the hundreds each fall. His research and teaching interests, in addition to first year engineering, include telemedicine, health informatics, rehabilitation engineering, and medical robotics. Dr. Feldman has collaborated with researchers and engineers from organizations including Tufts School of Veterinary Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital, Vecnacares, and Restoreskills.

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George D. Ricco Miami University orcid.org/0000-0002-4993-2971

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George D. Ricco is an engineering education educator who focuses on advanced analytical models applied to student progression, and teaching first-year engineering, engineering design principles, and project management.

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Catlin Wells

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As the Executive Director of Equity and Compliance at Wentworth Institute of Technology, Catlin Wells ensures equitable access to diverse living and learning environments by transforming University policies, practices, and programming in a way that centers inclusive excellence. With over five years of Civil Rights compliance experience, Catlin also serves as a consultant for both public and private institutions on matters relating to Title IX, Title VII, Title VI, and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Catlin holds an M.Ed. and a JD from the University of Cincinnati.

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Abstract

Biomedical Engineering (BME) programs train students to design and develop technologies and systems to enhance health and wellbeing. Typically, the curriculum for undergraduate BME students is quite demanding and loaded with lectures, labs, and projects. With such a heavy workload, BME students have limited opportunities to reflect on their values and goals, which can play an important role in their choice of post graduation plans. In this paper, we describe an approach we have implemented, which can empower students to identify and pursue post graduation opportunities which align with their personal goals and values. Students find that stepping back and reflecting, adds context and purpose to their education. Engineering in Biomedicine is a required weekly one-hour seminar course for senior students in BME at our university. The course addresses current topics, emerging technologies, and careers in the biomedical engineering field. The course consists of lectures and workshops given by practicing professionals from medical device, research and development organizations, hospitals and regulatory agencies, as well as alumni from the program. The course exposes BME students to the challenges, opportunities, and trends faced by BME professionals, and practitioners in the “real-world.”

The course supports a University-wide mission to deliver both high value learning and a transformative experience to students. As such, the goal of this course is not to merely expose students to information about job possibilities, but rather, this course teaches students about how to apply their learned engineering skills in a way that contributes to the field and holistically supports their continued growth as individuals and as engineering professionals.

During the recent Summer of 2023 semester, the course instructor partnered with a practitioner within the university’s Division of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) to give students tools to help them explore their individual post graduation goals. Through guided self-reflection, students were challenged to reflect upon their own identities and to consider the way that those identities shape their values, beliefs, priorities, and/or resource needs within a place of work. During a subsequent interactive workshop, students used the reflection exercise to further explore their workplace needs. With support from facilitators, students reviewed published job postings as well background information about employers to distill and identify a company’s values and culture. Based on this review of the company’s offerings and culture, students assessed how well a given employer aligned with their own values and priorities and discussed how they would approach an interview and job offer from that employer. Results of thematic analysis of students' reflections from this activity, reveal several human-centric themes among students' responses. Key themes uncovered include “a belief of the necessity of flexibility,” “interconnectedness-connections between people / co-workers / supervisors,” and the “importance of respect.” These results provide evidence that providing students with a space in their curriculum to assess and recalibrate their values and goals, particularly as they near graduation and a major transition into the “real-world” is relevant and valuable. These are important skills which add value and meaning to the students’ careers and life-long learning.

Citation
Format

Feldman, U., & Ricco, G. D., & Wells, C. (2024, June), Take this Job and Love It: Identity-Conscious Self-Reflection as a Tool to Support Individualized Career Exploration for Graduating Biomedical Engineering Students Paper presented at 2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Portland, Oregon. https://peer.asee.org/48052

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - Biomedical Engineering (BME) programs train students to design and develop technologies and systems to enhance health and wellbeing. Typically, the curriculum for undergraduate BME students is quite demanding and loaded with lectures, labs, and projects. With such a heavy workload, BME students have limited opportunities to reflect on their values and goals, which can play an important role in their choice of post graduation plans. In this paper, we describe an approach we have implemented, which can empower students to identify and pursue post graduation opportunities which align with their personal goals and values. Students find that stepping back and reflecting, adds context and purpose to their education.
Engineering in Biomedicine is a required weekly one-hour seminar course for senior students in BME at our university. The course addresses current topics, emerging technologies, and careers in the biomedical engineering field. The course consists of lectures and workshops given by practicing professionals from medical device, research and development organizations, hospitals and regulatory agencies, as well as alumni from the program. The course exposes BME students to the challenges, opportunities, and trends faced by BME professionals, and practitioners in the “real-world.”

The course supports a University-wide mission to deliver both high value learning and a transformative experience to students. As such, the goal of this course is not to merely expose students to information about job possibilities, but rather, this course teaches students about how to apply their learned engineering skills in a way that contributes to the field and holistically supports their continued growth as individuals and as engineering professionals. 

During the recent Summer of 2023 semester, the course instructor partnered with a practitioner within the university’s Division of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) to give students tools to help them explore their individual post graduation goals. Through guided self-reflection, students were challenged to reflect upon their own identities and to consider the way that those identities shape their values, beliefs, priorities, and/or resource needs within a place of work. During a subsequent interactive workshop, students used the reflection exercise to further explore their workplace needs. With support from facilitators, students reviewed published job postings as well background information about employers to distill and identify a company’s values and culture. Based on this review of the company’s offerings and culture, students assessed how well a given employer aligned with their own values and priorities and discussed how they would approach an interview and job offer from that employer.  
Results of thematic analysis of students&#39; reflections from this activity, reveal several human-centric themes among students&#39; responses. Key themes uncovered include “a belief of the necessity of flexibility,” “interconnectedness-connections between people / co-workers  / supervisors,” and the “importance of respect.” These results provide evidence that providing students with a space in their curriculum to assess and recalibrate their values and goals, particularly as they near graduation and a major transition into the “real-world” is relevant and valuable. These are important skills which add value and meaning to the students’ careers and life-long learning.

AU  - Uri Feldman
AU  - George D. Ricco
AU  - Catlin Wells
CY  - Portland, Oregon
DA  - 2024/06/23
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Take this Job and Love It: Identity-Conscious Self-Reflection as a Tool to Support Individualized Career Exploration for Graduating Biomedical Engineering Students
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/48052
ER  -