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Engendering diversity in engineering education and other STEM areas: A case study in sustainability
Conference paper   Peer reviewed

Engendering diversity in engineering education and other STEM areas: A case study in sustainability

Michael Christie, Maureen O'Neill, Kerry-Lee Rutter, Graham Young and Angeline G Medland
International Symposium on Project Approaches in Engineering Education, Vol.6, pp.117-122
8th International Symposium on Project Approaches in Engineering Education (PAEE) and the 14th Active Learning in Engineering Education (ALE) Workshop: Sustainability in Engineering Education (Guimaraes, Portugal, 06-Jul-2016–08-Jul-2016)
Department of Production and Systems - PAEE Association
2016
url
http://paee.dps.uminho.pt/proceedingsSCOPUS/PAEE2016+ALE%20proceedings.pdfView
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Abstract

Specialist Studies in Education diversity in engineering education sustainability in engineering education gender balance
In 1996 S.L. Hanson pointed out that young women were under represented in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) courses in tertiary education. Today, the participation rates of young women in these subjects continues to be comparatively low and their attrition rates high. The overall ratio of male to female students in western universities of technology has typically been 80% men and 20% women. During the same period (1996-2016) the numbers of students entering Engineering Education courses have been falling in developed countries. One way to solve the recruitment problem and to improve the quality of Engineering Education is to attract more women to study in this area. In 2016 the authors undertook a case study in a small, regional university in Queensland, Australia, to find out why so few young women enrolled in Engineering Education and other STEM subjects. The female students in our study, were enrolled in more traditional female courses such as nursing and education. The participants were asked if they had considered engineering or other STEM areas, and if they had, why had they decided to settle for nursing or teaching. A critique of the literature helped us develop a survey, focus group and interview schedules which we used in collecting data. This paper analyses the problem of how to engender more diversity in Engineering Education and makes some specific recommendations about ways of increasing female participation rates. Our study found that many of the factors that helped r hindered young women from applying for Engineering and other STEM courses twenty years ago, still apply today. In our case study, factors that were perceived to assist young women in undertaking Engineering Education included encouragement from teachers and parents, assistance from more competent peers and mentors and the use of Project Based and Active Learning pedagogies.

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