This qualitative study sought to describe and understand the experiences of
female students attending engineering colleges in Mexico and the sources of support and
strategies that helped them persist in their programs. The participants were 20 women
engineering students enrolled in at least their third year in selected colleges of
engineering in Mexico, in both public and private universities, and pursuing a variety of
engineering majors.
Findings focus on the experiences of female students that helped them stay in
their programs. Participants described their experiences in college as very challenging
and perceived the environment as hostile and uncertain. In addition, patriarchal Mexican
cultural values and stereotypes were identified by students as influencing and helping
shape the engineering environment. However, in this context, participants were able to
find sources of support and use strategies that helped them remain in their majors, such
as a strong desire to succeed, a perceived academic self-ability; and support from their
families, peers, institutions, and?most importantly?their professors. Furthermore, the fact that participants were able to persist in their programs gave them a sense of pride
and satisfaction that was shared by their families, peers, and faculty.
In addition, participants experienced contradictory forces and were constantly
negotiating between rejecting traditional gender norms and upholding the norms that are
so deeply engrained in Mexican society. Finally, as the students advanced in their
programs and became ?accepted to the club,? they tended to reproduce the maledominated
value system present in engineering colleges accepting their professors?
expectations of being ?top students,? accepting the elitist culture of engineering
superiority, and embracing the protection given by their male peers.
Retention of Mexican female engineering students is important for all
engineering colleges, but cultural factors must be taken into consideration. The
dominance of machismo attitudes and values in Mexican culture present specific
challenges to achieve an environment more supportive of women in Mexican
engineering colleges. Institutions need to be proactive and creative in order to help
faculty and administrators provide an environment in which female engineering students
can be successful.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:tamu.edu/oai:repository.tamu.edu:1969.1/ETD-TAMU-2008-12-210 |
| Date | 14 January 2010 |
| Creators | Villa, Maria G. |
| Contributors | Sandlin, Jennifer A., Clark, Carolyn |
| Source Sets | Texas A and M University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Book, Thesis, Electronic Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
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