2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Pathways from Engineering Programs to Labor Unions

Presented at Transgression, Conflict, and Altruism

According to the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, union density amongst engineering workers within the US hovers around 7%. Despite hundreds of thousands of US engineers participating in the labor movement, engineering education on labor unions has been virtually non-existent within US higher education engineering programs. US higher education engineering programs are critical junctures in the making of engineers that have long histories of ensnarement by corporate industries with vested interests in undermining organized labor. This stark and significant absence of labor education coupled with decades-long denunciations that many engineering professional societies have made to discourage participation of engineers in building labor unions and the labor movement interrupt engineers’ capacity to collectively leverage our power for safer, healthier, and more just workplaces and worlds. An imperative task in the (re)development of the US engineering workforce is to build and strengthen union density amongst engineers by expanding unionization pathways.

This paper offers a preliminary report back on a broader engineering workforce development project to nurture relationships between an unorganized (i.e. non-union) engineering research center and organized labor. Herein, we uplift stories from union members describing their pathways from higher education engineering programs to labor unions. Group interview conversations illuminating these stories offer broader contextualization for the sparseness and rarity of the paths from engineering programs to labor unions. Dialogue from group interviews further pointed toward opportunities to expand unionization pathways for engineering workers.

Authors

Dr. Joey Valle Purdue University [biography]

Joseph 'Joey' Valle is a queer Latine Ashkenazi Jew employed as a postdoctoral worker in the School of Engineering Education at Purdue University. Dr. Valle received a Ph.D in Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Michigan - Ann Arbor. They were awarded an NSF STEMEdIPRF Postdoctoral Fellowship: Advancing Engineering Education in Universities on Labor and Unions to study intersections of engineering and labor.
Lazlo Stepback Purdue University [biography]

Lazlo Stepback is a PhD student in Engineering Education at Purdue University. His current research interests focus on engineering ethics, the connections between personal morals and professional ethics, and how students ethically develop as engineers. He earned a B.S. in Chemical and Biochemical Engineering at the Colorado School of Mines (Golden, CO) in 2020.
Polly Parkinson Utah State University
Fawn Groves Utah State University
Dr. Angela Minichiello http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4545-9355 Utah State University [biography]

Angela (Angie) Minichiello is a military veteran, licensed mechanical engineer, and associate professor in the Department of Engineering Education at Utah State University. Her research examines issues of access, equity, and identity in the formation of engineers and a diverse, transdisciplinary 21st century engineering workforce. Angie received an NSF CAREER award in 2021 for her work with student veterans and service members in engineering.
Dr. Matthew W. Ohland http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4052-1452 Purdue University [biography]

Matthew W. Ohland is the Dale and Suzi Gallagher Professor and Associate Head of Engineering Education at Purdue University. He has degrees from Swarthmore College, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and the University of Florida. His research on the longitudinal study of engineering students and forming and managing teams has been supported by the National Science Foundation and the Sloan Foundation and his team received for the best paper published in the Journal of Engineering Education in 2008, 2011, and 2019 and from the IEEE Transactions on Education in 2011 and 2015. Dr. Ohland is an ABET Program Evaluator for ASEE and represents ASEE on the Engineering Accreditation Commission. He was the 2002–2006 President of Tau Beta Pi and is a Fellow of the ASEE, IEEE, and AAAS. He was inducted into the ASEE Hall of Fame in 2023.

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