Undefeated - Black Collegiate Women in Volleyball and STEM
- Conference
- Location
-
Minneapolis, MN
- Publication Date
-
August 23, 2022
- Start Date
-
June 26, 2022
- End Date
-
June 29, 2022
- Conference Session
- Page Count
-
22
- DOI
-
10.18260/1-2--41788
- Permanent URL
-
https://peer.asee.org/41788
- Download Count
-
821
Paper Authors
DeLean Tolbert Smith University of Michigan - Dearborn
Leroy Long Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University - Daytona Beach
Dr. Long is an energetic educator and change leader who believes everyone should “lead with love and follow-up with justice.” He is an Associate Professor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, FL where he directs a research team called Engineering, Arts & Sports Engagement (EASE). Dr. Long has helped to lead research, funded by the NCAA Innovations in Research and Practice Grant, to improve the well-being of the student-athlete through support of their career readiness. He has helped to lead research funded by NSF (award # 2024973) to examine the potential benefit of using critical narratives as a pedagogical tool in the professional formation of engineers.
Aishwary Pawar University of Michigan
Aishwary Pawar is a doctoral candidate in Industrial & Systems Engineering at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. His main research interest centers on investigating the factors that influence undergraduate enrollment, retention, graduation, and dropout. For his master’s thesis, Aishwary researched how student demographics and background characteristics lead to a more comprehensive understanding of a student’s enrolment and retention at an undergraduate college. For his Ph.D. thesis, he is working under the supervision of Dr. DeLean Tolbert Smith. Currently, his research is focused on using human-centered design and data analytics to improve student access and success in an undergraduate engineering program and support higher education professionals to recognize minoritized students' diverse needs. Aishwary also works as a Graduate Student Instructor at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, where he teaches lab sessions in Engineering and Engineering Design.
Abstract
Representation and inclusion of Black women are important in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics career pathways and sports such as volleyball. Disparities in representation have an impact on women’s median income, the quality of STEM-based solutions, and the diversity of women in leadership roles and continue pervasive narratives about who belongs in STEM. Athletics and STEM have been seen as vehicles to mobilize students economically and to develop their valuable lifelong skills such as time management, cross-cultural team-building, problem-solving, competitiveness, and resolve. In this qualitative study, the authors investigate the sports and STEM journeys of three Black women who are collegiate volleyball players. The theoretical framework is informed by intersectionality to understand the similarities between playing volleyball and pursuing a STEM degree at historically White institutions. One implication from this work is that with support at critical junctures and access points, more Black women can play sports at higher levels while also earning STEM degrees.
Tolbert Smith, D., & Long, L., & Pawar, A. (2022, August), Undefeated - Black Collegiate Women in Volleyball and STEM Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN. 10.18260/1-2--41788
ASEE holds the copyright on this document. It may be read by the public free of charge. Authors may archive their work on personal websites or in institutional repositories with the following citation: © 2022 American Society for Engineering Education. Other scholars may excerpt or quote from these materials with the same citation. When excerpting or quoting from Conference Proceedings, authors should, in addition to noting the ASEE copyright, list all the original authors and their institutions and name the host city of the conference. - Last updated April 1, 2015