2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Early Insights from a Coding Framework for Narratives of Engineering Practitioners and Pedagogical Development: IUSE-Funded Project Updates

Presented at NSF Grantees Poster Session II

This paper reports progress on an NSF IUSE-funded research project aimed at strengthening engineering ethics education through the use of moral narrative pedagogy. Our recent work includes two components: (1) analying interviews with practicing engineers that center on moral experiences and values to understand how professionals navigate ethical challenges and enact their values throughout their careers, and (2) developing pedagogical materials for classroom use.
In this paper, we first present the coding framework, grounded in Schwartz’ (2012) framework for human values and refined through analysis of 25 interviews with practicing engineers working across varied employment contexts, and share findings from that analysis that begin to answer the research questions guiding our project: (1) What moral values do engineers bring to their professional practice? (2) From what sources do they trace the origins of those values? and (3) How do they articulate the relationship between their values and their current work? Preliminary results from RQ 1 have been accepted to the 2025 FIE conference (Authors, 2025, forthcoming).
Second, we describe the development and first implementation of the resulting pedagogical materials. The pedagogical materials included multiple items: 1) a short introductory assignment asking students to reflect on their values and the relationship between their values and their projects; 2) a sample of 6 narratives, each constructed from one of the 25 interviews and purposefully selected to represent a range of demographic characteristics, careers, values, and perspectives, provided to students as reading material; 3) an in-class survey and activity to reflect on the readings and their own values; and finally, 4) a revision of the introductory assignment that also asked students to integrate relevant professional codes of ethics. We also describe the two surveys we created that draw on existing engineering identity measures (Godwin, 2016; Borrego et al., 2019) to provide pre- and post-data on the pedagogical activity.
The pedagogical materials have been piloted in one course, and although survey responses were low, instructor feedback on the materials have led to refinements in the approach, along with a revision of the data collection approach to enhance the response rate. Overall, the work completed thus far demonstrates how qualitative insights from engineers’ lived experiences both enhance our understanding of ethical practice and support student learning. As the project moves forward, we anticipate continued expansion and refinement of the coding framework and materials, further application of the pedagogical materials, and analysis of data collected from the interventions.

Authors

Bailey Kathryn McOwen Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University [biography]

Bailey McOwen is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Engineering Education at Virginia Tech as well as a master’s student in the Engineering Administration program of the Grado Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at Virginia Tech. Bailey’s research focuses on workforce development, specifically the continued professional training of engineering practitioners, engineering ethics in practice, and the application of emerging technologies in professional education. Through her research, service, and academic work, she aims to bridge engineering education and industry needs to support ethical engineering and lifelong learning practices across diverse engineering pathways.
Dr. Marie C. Paretti http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2202-6928 Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University [biography]

Marie C. Paretti is a Professor of Engineering Education at Virginia Tech and a founding co-editor-in-chief of Studies in Engineering Education. She holds a B.S. in chemical engineering and an M.A. in English from Virginia Tech and Ph.D. in English from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is PI or co-PI on numerous NSF grants exploring communication, teamwork, design, professional identity, and inclusion in engineering. Drawing on theories of situated learning and identity development, her research explores examines the ways in which engineering education supports students’ professional development in a range of contexts, with a particular focus on the school to work transition.
Dr. Dayoung Kim Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University [biography]

Dr. Dayoung Kim is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Engineering Education (College of Engineering) at Virginia Tech and a Director of the LABoratory for Innovative and REsponsible ENgineering workforce (LAB-IREEN). She also serves as an Executive Committee Member and Affiliate Faculty of the Center for Future Work Places and Practices (CFWPP). Her Engineering Practice research examines the practice of engineers across a range of employment settings, including business organizations – from startups to large, established firms – and government agencies. Building on insights from this work, her Engineering Workforce Development research focuses on developing the future engineering workforce capable of contributing innovatively and responsibly within their own contexts. Across her research, teaching, and service, she aims to bridge academia, industry, and government by translating insights from engineering practice into scalable systems for education, workforce development, and science and technology policy. She received her Ph.D. in Engineering Education from Purdue University and her B.S. and M.S. in Chemical Engineering from Yonsei University and Purdue University, respectively. She was the 2022 Christine Mirzayan Science & Technology Policy Graduate Fellow at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM).

Note

The full paper will be available to logged in and registered conference attendees once the conference starts on June 21, 2026, and to all visitors after the conference ends on June 24, 2026

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