2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Initiatives like the Next Generation Science Standards(NGSS) emphasize hands-on learning, allowing students to experience science and engineering practices similar to those of professionals, enhancing students' STEM understanding and career awareness [1]. Research also highlights that STEM education at the high school level plays a crucial role in developing essential skills like problem-solving and critical thinking. Other studies reinforce this by showing that project-based STEM learning fosters those integral skills for students' future STEM career paths. High school educators are encouraged to integrate science and engineering practices, such as developing models or carrying out investigations, to make STEM subjects more engaging and career-relevant. These factors also tie into students' selection of engineering as a viable major for their secondary education [2, 3]. Given the recommendations for introducing engineering topics at the K-12 level and the apparent benefits, providing engineering opportunities at that level is important. Currently, though, the level of engineering exposure high school students have before entering college is an open question.
Even though 41 states include engineering skills and knowledge within their education standards, eight explicitly referencing engineering [4], it's unclear what we can expect of our incoming students regarding their level of experience. The assumption at [ Institution ] has long been students have 0 experience entering our first-year engineering courses. To check that assumption, we developed a pilot survey to assess the availability of pre-college engineering opportunities and students' familiarity with relevant concepts and tools.
This paper will present the initial findings from that survey, which is currently in the field. The survey aims to determine the level of pre-college engineering experience students at [Institution] have before entering the First-Year engineering program. The survey asks students about the availability, and the lack thereof, of high school courses and extracurriculars on engineering topics (e.g., design, CAD, programming). It also asks about any extracurriculars or other community opportunities related to those topics. It includes follow-up questions about those resources if students indicated they participated in any of them. The survey also inquires about their awareness of and proficiency with a variety of common engineering tools and resources. Common demographic data is collected [5], as well as the type of high school attended. The level of detail is left open to students, allowing them to share as little or as much information about their experience, including identifiable details of those opportunities.
The pilot implementation of the survey occurred in mid-September of 2024. The survey was shared through all first-year engineering courses, reaching ~650 students. Out of that population, 54 students have responded as of this submission time. As data collection is still ongoing, results will be shared in the draft paper. The examination will begin with the overall availability of experiences, assessing trends based on demographics, particularly high school type, and geographics, and then comparing the open-ended responses. Future work will expand survey distribution, analyze results to inform curriculum updates and explore correlations between pre-college exposure and students' first-year performance in engineering courses.

[1] NGSS Lead States, Next Generation Science Standards: For States, By States. Washington, D.C.: The National Academies Press, 2013, p. 532.
[2] R.-A. Popa and L. Ciascai, "Students' Attitude towards STEM Education," Acta Didactica Napocensia, vol. 10, no. 4, pp. 55-62, 2017.
[3] J. Han, T. Kelley, and J. G. Knowles, "Factors Influencing Student STEM Learning: Self-Efficacy and Outcome Expectancy, 21st Century Skills, and Career Awareness," Journal for STEM Education Research, vol. 4, no. 2, pp. 117-137, 2021/09/01 2021, doi: 10.1007/s41979-021-00053-3.
[4] R. L. Carr, L. D. Bennett IV, and J. Strobel, "Engineering in the K‐12 STEM standards of the 50 U.S. states: An analysis of presence and extent," Journal of Engineering Education, vol. 101, no. 3, pp. 539-564, 2012.
[5] T. Fernandez et al., "More comprehensive and inclusive approaches to demographic data collection," presented at the 2016 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana, Jun 26-29, 2016. [Online]. Available: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/enegs/60/.