2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

The recruitment and retention of diverse students in engineering professions remains a significant challenge in the United States. With support from an Improving Undergraduate STEM Education: Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI Program) NSF grant, Marymount University (MU) is currently addressing this challenge through Project DREAM (Diversity Recruited into Engineering through Advanced Making). We report here on the first results from Project DREAM. MU has developed and piloted 1) a two-week, immersive summer program on "Maker-Neering" targeting teaching 3D printing, design, arduino programming and VR design to recruit students into a new engineering program and 2) piloted the first year of an innovative year-long introductory engineering course using low-cost makerspace technologies (including 3D printers, arduino, python programming) using evidence-based pedagogical methods to improve foundational engineering skills and develop solutions to problems impacting community members. We have successfully implemented both the two-week summer program and the year-long introductory engineering course, and we have seen students complete projects directly impacting community needs (i.e. developing a submersible for ecological research), faculty developing courses with best practice for diverse students and student projects presented at scientific conferences. Through successful completion of this project, MU aims to provide our curriculum materials as an effective, accessible and practical solution for increasing student success rates and improving representation of historically under-represented in STEM students in the engineering workforce. In addition, we believe this project will provide provide a low-cost, practical and accessible model for any educational institution to provide in-demand engineering skills, improve engagement, provide foundational engineering skills to underprepared students, increase STEM opportunities for UR in STEM students, increase collaborations between students, universities and their communities, and improve engagement and retention in STEM for students upon graduation.