2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Teamwork plays a central role in engineering education, shaping students’ experiences as they learn to collaborate, communicate, and apply technical knowledge. Prior research on teamwork has found that gender-minority students are often steered toward support roles, judged by gender communication norms, and excluded from full design participation. In the first-year context, when students are still developing their sense of belonging and engineering identity, teamwork becomes a critical site where the participation of students with marginalized gender identities can be either reinforced or undermined.

This study asks: How do first-year engineering students who self-identify with gender identities historically marginalized in engineering (UGM) experience teamwork in a project-based engineering course. Specifically, we examine what UGM students find encouraging or discouraging, how team experiences shape their developing engineering identity, and what team dynamics they see as supportive or limiting. Students in a two-semester introductory engineering course at a large, public, mid-Atlantic R1 institution responded to end-of-semester reflection questions about their experiences working in design teams. Qualitative analysis of reflections from 72 consenting UGM students was guided by Godwin’s framework of engineering identity [1] and Hesse-Biber’s feminist research approaches [2] to examine what team dynamics they perceived as supportive or discouraging.

Themes emerged around access to design versus administrative work, recognition of contributions, and the influence of team dynamics on students’ developing views of themselves in engineering. UGM students reported feeling most encouraged when tasks were distributed equitably; their opinions were respected, and they were able to participate meaningfully in design work. They felt most discouraged when administrative labor was disproportionately assigned to them or when access to design opportunities was limited. These findings highlight how first-year teamwork can shape UGM students’ understanding of their place in engineering and suggest the importance of pedagogical strategies to foster more equitable and supportive team structures.