In the United States context, there is a particularly prevalent dialogue about the transformative power of an engineering degree for underserved students. Long positioned as a mechanism for moving up the social ladder, engineering education is often discussed as a mechanism for upward mobility, promising underserved students the opportunity to climb. However, a critical examination of who enrolls and persists in engineering degree programs suggests not everyone can equitably leverage the transformative power of an engineering degree, with persistent inequities for underserved students. Though literature highlights systemic barriers faced by underserved engineering students, much less is known about how underserved students navigate barriers to pursue an engineering bachelor's degree. Accordingly, the purpose of my study was to explore how students from underserved backgrounds navigate their educational trajectories, focusing on the interplay between structures and agency. Using a Bourdieusian lens, my study was guided by the overarching research question: In their narratives, how do students from underserved backgrounds describe navigating their educational trajectories towards a bachelor's engineering degree? I used a single case study methodology with embedded units of analysis to explore this research question. My primary data sources included narrative interviews with 32 underserved engineering students and geospatial community-level data extrapolated from students' home zip codes. My results indicate that underserved engineering students describe a variety of strategies to enact agency by planning, optimizing, and, at times, redirecting their educational trajectories. This study also highlights the influence of family, community, economic, and political environments on the educational journeys of underserved engineering students, as students described navigating and adapting to these various social environments. Students also describe their environments as dynamic, with trajectories changing based on critical incidents such as a parent illness or loss of work. Lastly, students' narratives highlight a diverse range of reasons for pursuing engineering, which often extended beyond private goods approaches to engineering education. My results present implications for engineering education, the most notable of which is that underserved students are not a monolithic group and represent a diverse range of lived experiences. My results also highlight agency as a collective endeavor, challenging popular notions that agency is operationalized at the level of a single individual. Lastly, students' lived experiences with material hardship highlight the dynamic and multidimensional nature of economic disadvantage. Such insights compel engineering educators to reexamine how we conceptualize and measure economic disadvantage in higher education. Ultimately, this research highlights opportunities to increase access and equity in engineering education for underserved students. / Doctor of Philosophy / In the United States, engineering is often viewed as a transformative career for underserved students. Long positioned as a mechanism for moving up the social ladder, engineering education is positioned to underserved students as an opportunity to climb. However, inequities in engineering education persist, with low income and first generation students underrepresented in engineering. The purpose of my study was to explore how students from underserved backgrounds navigate their educational trajectories, focusing on the interplay between societal forces (i.e., structures) and individual decision-making (i.e., agency). My study was guided by the overarching research question: In their narratives, how do students from underserved backgrounds describe navigating their educational trajectories towards a bachelor's engineering degree? My primary data sources included narrative interviews with 32 underserved engineering students and geospatial community-level data. My results indicate that underserved engineering students describe a variety of strategies to plan, optimize, and, at times, redirect their educational trajectories. This study highlights the influence of family, community, economic, and political environments on the educational journeys of underserved engineering students. Additionally, students describe their environments as dynamic, with trajectories changing based on critical incidents such as a parent illness or loss of work. Lastly, students' narratives highlight a diverse range of reasons for pursuing engineering, which often extended beyond private goods approaches to engineering education. My results highlight agency as a collective family endeavor, challenging popular notions that agency is operationalized at the level of a single individual. Lastly, students' lived experiences with material hardship highlight the dynamic and multidimensional nature of economic disadvantage. Such insights compel engineering educators to reexamine how we conceptualize and measure economic disadvantage in higher education. Ultimately, this research highlights opportunities to increase access and equity in engineering education for underserved students.

This project documents my efforts to publish STS- and gender theory-informed articles in engineering education journals. It analyzes the processes of writing and revising three articles submitted to three different journals, aiming to shed light on the field of engineering education, gender research therein, and contribute to feminist science studies literature on the challenges and opportunities of interdisciplinary work across women's studies and STEM fields. Building upon Wenger's concept of brokering, I analyze how I brought previously underexplored STS and feminist theory literature into engineering education journals. In producing this dissertation, I aim to illuminate some of the efforts and challenges of bringing STS and Women's Studies (WS) topics into engineering education journals – thus producing an account of brokering practices and an example of scalable scholarship. The first chapter introduces engineering education research (EER) as a field of inquiry, situates my project with respect to current feminist science studies, summarizes the framework of brokering that informs my analyses, and describes my methodology. The second chapter describes my initial attempts at brokering by identifying and bridging differences and the preliminary brokering practices that emerged through writing and revising the first of my three articles. It discusses an article published in Journal of Engineering Education that analyzes the uses of feminist theory in EER and argues that further engagement with a broader range of feminist theories could benefit EER. The third chapter describes how some of these practices were reinforced, but also supplemented, while writing and revising the second article. It discusses an article published in International Journal of Engineering Education that analyzes problematizations of underrepresentation in EER and argues that further reflection upon and formal discussion of how underrepresentation is framed could benefit EER. The forth chapter describes how the established brokering practices guided writing the third article, making the process easier as I had become more comfortable with the requirements and challenges of brokering. It discusses an article submitted to European Journal of Engineering Education that analyzes feminist research methodologies in the context of EER, using data from interviews with feminist engineering educators. The fifth chapter concludes by summarizing the brokering practices and discussing their respective challenges, discussing the implications of this project for STS and WS, and, finally, by discussing other implications for peer review engineering education. The Appendix contains aims, scope, author guidelines, and review criteria for the three journals. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 each begin with a narrative recounting of the practices of brokering that went into producing and revising each article. The narratives describe processes of writing and preparing to submit the articles, reviews received, and subsequent revision processes. The published or submitted articles appear after the brokering narrative. / Ph. D.

The purpose of this study is to understand how engineering students perceive the patterns of culture at the disciplinary level using Hofstede's constructs (power distance, individualism, uncertainty avoidance, and masculinity). The methodology design for this study is mixed methods. More specifically, the design of this study is an explanatory sequential design that begins with the collection and analysis of quantitative data from a version of Hofstede's survey developed by Sharma (2010), followed by subsequent collection and analysis of qualitative data, with the qualitative analysis being informed by preliminary results from the initial quantitative phase. Results from the quantitative study led to a review of the literature regarding Hofstede's main critiques and how other authors have successfully implemented his model in different contexts, and qualitative data collection with semi-structured interviews with undergraduate students. There are three aims of this study, which are addressed and presented in three separate manuscripts. The first aim (Manuscript 1) was identifying if Hofstede's theory of dimensions of national culture can map to academic disciplines. Results from surveying 3388 undergraduate students provided scores on Hofstede's dimensions for each major. Responses matched the national culture of the students rather than the disciplinary culture; therefore, Hofstede's theory didn't map to explain cultural differences in academic majors. The second aim (Manuscript 2) of this study was to review the extensive available literature regarding the critiques of Hofstede's model and its implementation in different settings. Results provided with conceptual, and methodological critiques and misuse of his theory that allowed us to understand the value of his model to understand cultural differences at the national level, as well as the value of the dimensions to inform our qualitative research design. The third aim (Manuscript 3) of this study was to explore students' perceptions of disciplinary engineering culture and how it compared to other disciplines using a qualitative interview protocol that provided rich findings that complement the quantitative results. Results from interviewing 24 students in industrial and systems engineering, electrical and computer engineering, marketing, and industrial design provided with valuable information on how students perceive their disciplinary culture in terms of what it is valued, how they learn, how it is taught, why they learn, how it is going to be used in the workplace, and the reason for select the major. Implications for research and practice in the engineering education field are provided to inform how to make decisions on engineering curriculum, and engineering classrooms and try to find ways to improve some of the issues that engineering education has been facing for the last decades. / Ph. D.

Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education is spurred by an economic and social need for cross-discipline understanding of complex, worldwide problems, made through intentional connections between two or more STEM subject areas. In order for educators to articulate these connections, research suggests they must have a firm understanding of the individual disciplines through both content and pedagogical approaches. In 2007, as a leader in non-formal STEM education, 4-H made a specific commitment to improve STEM literacy in America's youth by forming the 4-H Science mission mandate, therefore increasing its STEM programming. This qualitative study examined how 4-H educators come to understand STEM and engineering concepts and utilizations, and whether their backgrounds influence their verbalization or expectations of engineering. Narrative themes emerged that help determine how engineering is currently and can continue to be more clearly and consistently articulated and connected within 4-H programming. Themes included 1) a lack of direct connection or understanding of engineering characteristics to 4-H programs, 2) familiarity with and ability to apply engineering characteristics to the Do Reflect Apply model, and 3) the importance of volunteers as STEM and engineering educators within 4-H programming. Strategies for professional development emphasizing engineering understandings, learning outcomes, and broad applications were discovered. Professional development should consider the effects of engineering and STEM self-efficacy, as well as professional identity development. Additionally, it utilize approaches such as the Do Reflect Apply model, and reflect on the learning objectives 4-H educators strive to achieve during STEM programming in conjunction with life-skills. / Master of Science in Life Sciences / In 2007, 4-H made a specific commitment to improve Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) literacy in America’s youth by forming the 4-H Science mission mandate. However, research suggests in order for educators to successfully implement STEM programming, they need to understand the content and best teaching practices, which presents a unique obstacle for 4-H educators as many lack formal education in both. By conducting interviews with current 4-H educators in Virginia, this research begins to highlight the importance behind STEM understanding and STEM teaching practices – particularly as they pertain to engineering projects. These interview and data analysis process uncovered common themes including connections between engineering and current 4-H educational approaches, as well as the existing barriers between volunteers as STEM educators and successful programming. In order to improve STEM education within 4-H, professional development strategies focusing on engineering characteristics, outcomes aligning with 4-H goals, and applications to real-world problems should be implemented.

Research on engineering design is a core area of concern within engineering education, and a fundamental understanding of how engineering students approach and undertake design is necessary in order to develop effective design models and pedagogies. This dissertation contributes to scholarship on engineering design by addressing a critical, but as yet underexplored, problem: how does the context in which students design shape their design practices? Using a qualitative study comprising of video data of design sessions, focus group interviews with students, and archives of their design work, this research explored how design decisions and actions are shaped by context, specifically the context of higher education. To develop a theoretical explanation for observed behavior, this study used the "nested structuration" framework proposed by Perlow, Gittell, & Katz (2004). This framework explicated how teamwork is shaped by mutually reinforcing relationships at the individual, organizational, and institutional levels. I appropriated this framework to look specifically at how engineering students working on a course-related design project identify constraints that guide their design and how these constraints emerge as students interact while working on the project. I first identified and characterized the parameters associated with the design project from the student perspective and then, through multi-case studies of four design teams, I looked at the role these parameters play in student design practices. This qualitative investigation of first-year engineering student design teams revealed mutual and interconnected relationships between students and the organizations and institutions that they are a part of. In addition to contributing to research on engineering design, this work provides guidelines and practices to help design educators develop more effective design projects by incorporating constraints that enable effective design and learning. Moreover, I found that when appropriated in the context of higher education, multiple sublevels existed within nested structuration's organizational context and included course-level and project-level factors. The implications of this research can be used to improve the design of engineering course projects as well as the design of research efforts related to design in engineering education. / Ph. D.

The General Engineering Program exists at Virginia Tech to provide curriculums that engage, challenge and support entry-level engineers. One important part of this initiative is helping students identify with a specific engineering branch, and overtime develop an identity within it. Yet, there exists little research on what entry-level engineers believe it means to be an engineer, especially during these stages of early formation and continual shifting. In order to generate insight on this topic we developed a contextual inquiry method to help inquire into engineering identity. Two participants were placed in an online chatroom and allowed to talk for ten minutes, with one trying to answer the question 'Am I talking to an engineer or not?' and asked to give their reasoning. Comparisons allow entry-level engineering students to articulate their beliefs on what characteristics, behaviors and personalities make up their cohort -- thus exposing their ideas about identity. Moreover, this methodology also provides opportunities for participants to critique their own bias and further develop and expose their opinions on identity. Additionally, our findings showcase the complexity around student's perceptions of engineers. For example, participants' responses pointed to: many sources that inform identity, the difficulty of identifying what is uniquely engineering, how identity is impacted by the ideal image of an engineer, that identity is a spectrum, and that identity varies with respect to associations and time. As a result, through our inquiry and representation of results we demonstrate the validity of our methodology as a HCI research tool along with the power of narrative forms of representation. / Master of Science / The General Engineering Program exists at Virginia Tech to provide curriculums that engage, challenge and support entry-level engineers. One important part of this initiative is helping students identify with a specific type of engineering, and overtime develop an identity within it. Yet, there exists little research on what entry-level engineers believe it means to be an engineer, especially during their freshmen year of college when they are still forming and changing their ideas about engineering identity. In order to generate insight on this topic we developed a methodology to help inquire into engineering identity. Two participants at a time were placed in an online chatroom and allowed to talk for ten minutes, with one trying to answer the question ‘Am I talking to an engineer or not?’ and asked to give their reasoning. Comparisons allow entry-level engineering students to articulate their beliefs on what characteristics, behaviors and personalities make up their cohort -- thus exposing their ideas about identity. Moreover, this methodology also provides opportunities for participants to critique their own assumptions about engineering identity and further develop and expose their opinions on identity. Additionally, our findings showcase the complexity around student’s perceptions of engineers. For example, participants’ responses pointed to: many sources that inform identity, the difficulty of identifying what is uniquely engineering, how identity is impacted by the ideal image of an engineer, that identity is a spectrum, and that identity varies with respect to associations and time. As a result, through our inquiry and representation of results we demonstrate the validity of our methodology as a Human Computer Interaction research tool along with the power of using written stories to represent results.

The value of diversity in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) fields has long been a leading topic of discussion among campus administrators and government officials. However, the number of African American women in STEM, and the engineering field in particular, has seen little growth over the past twenty years. To change this trend, there must be enhanced efforts to provide an environment and resources to support the retention of these women, and mentoring can play a key role. To gain a better understanding of the mentoring needs of these women, this research investigates the mentoring experiences of 16 current senior African American female engineering students. What is clear is that African American women have a unique set of experiences based on the multiple sets of identity groups that they claim membership in. Intersectionality emphasizes the implications of the multiplication of these identities and how that multiplication impacts experiences. This research, addresses the intersection by exploring faculty mentoring relationships, with particular focus on the implications of having a matched (same race and gender) or an unmatched mentor. Current research is inconsistent on the benefits of each type. Using phenomenography, this investigation of the various aspects of mentoring relationships that are salient to 16 African American women in engineering uncovered seven categories of mentoring: Guide, Proactive Supporter, Reactive Listener, Nurturer, Just in Time, Caring, and Role Model. Variation across these mentoring categories were reflected in the mentoring aspects that participants perceived. This set of interpersonal (listen, invested, and shared experience) and professional (development, opportunity, advice, and example) aspects depicted a set of mentoring types that varied in comprehensiveness. Additionally, variation in the race and gender of each mentor across each category suggested some trends surrounding the mentor characteristics that most frequently provided certain aspects. However, all of the categories that emerged were perceived to be effective. It is desired that the results of this research will impact the ways in which faculty understand the needs of African American women in engineering. / Ph. D.

With student attrition in engineering most frequently occurring during the 2nd year due to perceptions of poor teaching and advising, curricular overload, and a lack of a sense of belonging, this study sought to address these concerns in a novel way through videos. This study was inspired by the success of existing on-campus mentoring services that enlist more advanced students to act as academic and cultural mentors, and sought to connect with students who may feel unwelcome or socially inhibited from attending similar services. On-campus support services have historically experienced service-level concerns with regards to overhead costs that have resulted in targeting specific audiences over restricted durations of time. Through these measures, both lack of awareness and social inhibition to attendance has resulted in some students not receiving the support that they need in order to succeed in engineering. To address this concern, this study developed and tested a video-based intervention on 2nd year students identified as 'at-risk-for-attrition' through GPA and self-reported measures of belonging in engineering. The intervention involved 18 junior- and senior-level engineering students participating in videotaped interviews that were segmented by topic into 305 videos and posted to a private Vimeo channel. These videos acted as static virtual mentors for the study participants. To evaluate the impact of these videos, an exploratory case study was conducted with 13 'at-risk-for-attrition' participants that included 7 women and 6 men. The participants completed a pre-intervention interview concerning their current status in engineering, a reflection of their first year, and perceptions of on-campus support services. Participants were then asked to watch one hour of videos, keep a notebook of their experience, and record the date and time that each video was watched. Once completed, participants participated in a post-intervention interview concerning their video choices, reactions, and outcomes of the experience, and any affordances that they saw in the intervention tool. Drawing on expectancy-value theory, the results of this study yielded a model for how participants made their video selections, how they reacted to virtual mentors and interpreted their video content, and how these reactions led to collective identity beliefs and intentions to act on the advice provided. Additionally, participants highlighted some of the affordances of offering mentoring through static videos. Of particular importance was the perception of shared identity between participants and mentors as a precursor to impacting future intentions to act on their advice. The findings led to recommendations regarding the redefinition of desired mentor traits for at-risk-for-attrition students was discovered, and also, the potential for offering virtual mentoring as a proxy or precursor to attending on-campus services without the program- and student-level concerns hindering current offerings. / Ph. D.

The ubiquitous use of computers and greater accessibility of the Internet have triggered widespread use of educational innovations such as online discussion forums, Wikis, Open Educational Resources, MOOCs, to name a few. These advances have led to the creation of a wide range of instructional videos, written documents and discussion archives by engineering learners seeking to expand their learning and advance their knowledge beyond the engineering classroom. However, it remains a challenging task to assess the quality of knowledge advancement on these learning platforms particularly due to the informal nature of engagement as a whole and the massive amount of learner-generated data. This research addresses this broad challenge through a research approach based on the examination of the state of knowledge advancement, analysis of relationships between variables indicative of knowledge creation and participation in knowledge creation, and identification of groups of learners. The study site is an online engineering community, All About Circuits, that serves 31,219 electrical and electronics engineering learners who contributed 503,908 messages in 65,209 topics. The knowledge creation metaphor provides the guiding theoretical framework for this research. This metaphor is based on a set of related theories that conceptualizes learning as a collaborative process of developing shared knowledge artifacts for the collective benefit of a community of learners. In a knowledge-creating community, the quality of learning and participation can be evaluated by examining the degree of collaboration and the advancement of knowledge artifacts over an extended period of time. Software routines were written in Python programming language to collect and process more than half a million messages, and to extract user-produced data from 87,263 web pages to examine the use of engineering terms, social networks and engineering artifacts. Descriptive analysis found that state of knowledge advancement varies across discussion topics and the level of engagement in knowledge creating activities varies across individuals. Non-parametric correlation analysis uncovered strong associations between topic length and knowledge creating activities, and between the total interactions experienced by individuals and individual engagement in knowledge creating activities. On the other hand, the variable of individual total membership period has week associations with individual engagement in knowledge creating activities. K-means clustering analysis identified the presence of eight clusters of individuals with varying lengths of participation and membership, and Kruskal-Wallis tests confirmed that significant differences between the clusters. Based on a comparative analysis of Kruskal-Wallis Score Means and the examination of descriptive statistics for each cluster, three groups of learners were identified: Disengaged (88% of all individuals), Transient (10%) and Engaged (2%). A comparison of Spearman Correlations between pairs of variables suggests that variable of individual active membership period exhibits stronger association with knowledge creation activities for the group of Disengaged, whereas the variable of individual total interactions exhibits stronger association with knowledge creation activities for the group of Engaged. Limitations of the study are discussed and recommendations for future work are made. / Ph. D.

As computers become more prevalent (and required) in engineering classrooms, it becomes increasingly important to address the dichotomy in our current understanding of their impact on student attention and learning. While some researchers report increased student learning, others report computers as a distraction to learning. To address this conflict, the research community must gain a fundamental understanding of how students use their computers in-class and how student attention is connected to learning and pedagogical practice. By gaining such an understanding, instructors\' design of classroom interventions aimed at increasing positive computer usage will be better informed. The purpose of this quantitative research study is to answer the overarching question "How do students use computers in technology-infused classrooms?" through an investigation of student attention. Based on the premise that one\'s senses must be oriented towards a stimulus to receive the stimulus, it is hypothesized that attention in a technology-infused classroom can be measured by monitoring a students\' top-most, active window (the Active Window Method). This novel approach mitigates issues with prior data collection methods, and allows researchers the opportunity to capture real-time student computer usage. This research serves the dual purpose of validating the Active Window Method and investigating applications of the method. The Active Window Method is validated by comparing real-time active window data with in-class observations of attention in engineering courses with large enrollments. The bootstrap resampling technique is used to estimate mean error rate. Post-tests are used to establish convergent validity by relating learning to active window data. Polytomous logistic regression is used to examine the probability of post-test score (response) over the range of attention levels (factor). Subsequent to validation, two applications of the Active Window Method were pursued. First, student computer use is characterized in multiple large lecture sections. Second, in answering calls to link student computer usage to pedagogical practices, an investigation into the relationship between pedagogy and attention is conducted by aligning time stamps of the active window record with technology-infused pedagogical activities identified in video recordings of lectures. An intervention time series analysis is employed to quantify the change in average attention due to pedagogical activities. Results demonstrate strong construct validity when directly comparing active window and attention. Convergent validity was weak when relating active window to learning. Results from the two applications illustrate that instructors\' use of technology and their pedagogical practices impact student computer use. Specifically, collecting student-generated content and polling question activities encourage on-task behavior. However, activities that include a website link encourage off-task behavior. / Ph. D.