Work in Progress: Diversity & Equity Training for Undergraduate Engineering Teaching Assistants
- Conference
- Location
-
Minneapolis, MN
- Publication Date
-
August 23, 2022
- Start Date
-
June 26, 2022
- End Date
-
June 29, 2022
- Conference Session
-
First-Year Programs Division Technical Session 12: Work-in-Progress Postcard Session #1
- Page Count
-
12
- DOI
-
10.18260/1-2--41568
- Permanent URL
-
https://peer.asee.org/41568
- Download Count
-
285
Paper Authors
Ingrid Paredes New York University Tandon School of Engineering
Dr. Ingrid J. Paredes is a Visiting Industry Assistant Professor in the First-Year Engineering Program at NYU Tandon School of Engineering. She studied chemical engineering and received her B.S. and M.S. at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, and her Ph.D. at NYU Tandon School of Engineering. Her interests include diversity, equity, and inclusion in higher education and sustainability education for engineers.
Rui Li New York University
Dr. Li earned his master’s degree in Chemical Engineering from the Imperial College of London, 2009 and his Ph.D in Robotics from the University of Georgia, 2020. His current research interests are student motivation, inclusive learning and educational robotics.
Chris Woods New York University
Chris Woods is the senior director of inclusive policy and director of the NYU LGBTQ+ Center. He serves as the primary point of contact for inclusive policies, practices, and initiatives for LGBTQ+ students, faculty, and staff, in addition to the day-to-day management of the LGBTQ+ Center. Additionally, he collaborates with University partners and colleagues on inclusive policy development and operational work to advance the University's core mission in support of global inclusion, diversity, belonging, equity, and access (GIDBEA). He is a former board co-chair and racial justice chair for the Consortium of Higher Education LGBT Resource Professionals and was a chapter contributor in the 2017 book, Queer People of Color in Higher Education. He has dedicated much of his academic and professional life to LGBTQ+ inclusion and diversity, equity, and inclusion in higher education and given talks on the topics of queer and trans people of color, racial justice and intersectionality, bi/multiracial identities, and the intersections of faith, race, and sexuality at conferences, colleges, and universities across the nation. Chris received his Bachelor of Arts in English and Religious Studies from New York University and his Master of Arts in Higher Education and Student Affairs from The Ohio State University. He is currently pursuing a PhD in Sociology of Education at NYU’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development.
Jack Bringardner New York University Tandon School of Engineering
Jack Bringardner is the Assistant Dean for Academic and Curricular Affairs at NYU Tandon School of Engineering. He is an Industry Associate Professor and Director of the General Engineering Program. He teaches the first-year engineering course Introduction to Engineering and Design. He is also the Director of the Vertically Integrated Projects Program at NYU. His Vertically Integrated Projects course is on the future of engineering education. His primary focus is developing curriculum, mentoring students, and engineering education research, particularly for project-based curriculum, first-year engineering, and student success. He is active in the American Society for Engineering Education and is the NYU ASEE Campus Representative. He serves on the First-Year Programs Division Executive Board as well as the Webmaster for the ASEE First-Year Programs Division and the First-Year Engineering Experience Conference.
Victoria Bill New York University Tandon School of Engineering
Victoria Bill is the Managing Director of the MakerSpace Lab & Experiential Learning Center at NYU Tandon School of Engineering. She is also an adjunct professor in the first-year engineering and VIP programs, as well as a PhD student in Engineering Education at The Ohio State University. Her research interests include asset-based professional and technical skill development of engineers through extracurricular and co-curricular activities.
Sooah Kwak New York University Tandon School of Engineering
Higher education administrator with a background in student development and diversity, equity, and inclusion education and initiatives.
Marie Burns New York University Tandon School of Engineering
Kaz Burns is an Undergraduate Head Teaching Assistant in the First-Year Engineering Program at NYU Tandon School of Engineering. She is in her fifth year studying chemistry and chemical & biomolecular engineering at the NYU College of Arts and Science and Tandon School of Engineering. Her interests include increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion education and mental health support within the undergraduate engineering community.
Ameya Palav New York University Tandon School of Engineering
Mei Schuerch
Abstract
Undergraduate TAs play a key role in student success in our course. Effective TAs are leaders and peer mentors; they assist with content delivery, guide students through hands-on labs and projects, and provide regular feedback on student progress. To ensure the course runs smoothly, TAs organize and participate in peer-led training throughout the academic year. Historically, training focused on building familiarity with the technical content of the course. Feedback from the TA body, however, revealed that TAs wanted more training on DEI issues in STEM. The TAs emphasized that such training would improve their interactions with their students, their peers, and colleagues beyond the university. Their recognition of the need for DEI training mirrored recent calls to address issues of inequity and injustice in academia. We have thus sought to co-create DEI training for our program with the TA body and DEI experts at our institution.
In response to student feedback, we plan to scaffold the training to introduce concepts related to inclusivity to students, build skills of inclusive peer leaders, and finally connect TAs to resources for bringing these skills into the workplace. In 2021, we delivered two iterations of the introduction, where TAs participated in workshops on building inclusive communities, using inclusive language, and identifying conflict resolution techniques. At the end of the second training, the TAs created a list of community agreements to ensure that the lessons learned in these workshops informed community interactions going forward. The workshops, which took place over several days, featured active discussions that connected concepts to the TA experience.
Preliminary surveys showed that students overall found the training activities valuable and relevant to their roles as peer educators. Several TAs identified specific issues to address, such as ableism, gender bias, and racism, for future training. We plan to implement these discussions in the near future; regular climate surveys, listening sessions, and self-evaluations will be used to evaluate how effective the training sessions are at fostering an inclusive environment. Through this process, we seek to establish a set of DEI learning objectives for undergraduate TAs applicable beyond our institution.
Paredes, I., & Li, R., & Woods, C., & Bringardner, J., & Bill, V., & Kwak, S., & Burns, M., & Palav, A., & Schuerch, M. (2022, August), Work in Progress: Diversity & Equity Training for Undergraduate Engineering Teaching Assistants Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN. 10.18260/1-2--41568
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