2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

The impact of role models in inspiring individuals to achieve their life goals is widely discussed in literature. Role models are known to support retention, recruitment, and sense of belonging in STEM and engineering disciplines. College faculty, and particularly those with identities with limited representation in STEM, such as women faculty and faculty of color are known to play a key role in enrollment and performance of students sharing their identities. Given what is known about role modeling, this study aims to explore the perceptions of engineering faculty about their own function as role models for future generations of STEM professionals. Furthermore, we explore the role models that inspired current engineering faculty to choose their paths. In this regard, we aim to assess role models (media or real-life individuals) that influenced the current engineering faculty’s identity development. Our research questions are: 1) How often and in which areas do engineering faculty believe they support the growth of their students as role models? 2) What kind of role models did current engineering faculty had while growing up? and 3) how these beliefs and experiences about role modeling vary across gender and race/ethnicity?
To answer our research questions, we collected faculty responses through an ongoing anonymous survey of engineering faculty distributed across the 30 largest engineering universities in the US. For data analysis we aim to use descriptive statistics, as well as suitable group comparisons to assess the difference in role models across gender and ethnicity. For example, we will conduct multiple ANOVAs for each area of student support (e.g., technical knowledge, wellbeing practices, professional behavior etc.) that faculty provide as role models. This work in progress is part of a larger study that aims to assess gender bias faced by engineering faculty. Based on our results, the study aims to bring insights about the types of role models that inspired women to opt for engineering faculty careers. We expect the findings of the study would bring new insights into the role modelling practices for development of engineering identity among younger generations.