2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

This empirical research brief investigates students' experiences with stress during their undergraduate education. Engineering students face distinct stressors compared to non-engineering students, including rigorous academic demands, highly competitive environments, and lack of belonging due to the underrepresentation of diverse identities. While resilience and coping have been studied in overall student populations, less is known about how engineering students face challenges and the resources they use to overcome them. Understanding their experiences is critical, as students’ mental health and identity is often closely tied to academic performance, which can exacerbate the pressures of entering an academically demanding engineering environment. Therefore, this study examines how undergraduate engineering students adapt to experiences of stress using Schlossberg’s Transition Theory, which focuses on four constructs: 1) Situation: the catalyst behind the transition, 2) Self: the characteristics, background, and values an individual has, 3) Support: the community that impacted the transition, and 4) Strategies: how one learned to manage their situation. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to understand students’ experience, allowing participants to reflect on their personal challenges, sources of support, and strategies for persistence.

After transcribing the interviews, we engaged in an analysis of narratives approach. Verbatim transcripts were first smoothed to create concise, cohesive narratives that preserved participants’ voices while distilling their central messages. This process was iterative, with multiple rounds of refinement to ensure each narrative accurately captured the essence of the participant’s experience. Once these narratives were developed, we conducted inductive coding, guided by the constructs of our analytic framework, and identified emergent themes across participants’ stories. To deepen engagement with participants’ stories, select narratives were collaboratively transformed into artwork that conveyed the student’s experiences. This arts-based approach served as both a visual interpretation of the experience, as well as a dissemination tool, allowing us to translate complex narratives into accessible representations that invite broader dialogue about student well-being.

Through this paper we will discuss the stories of three students as they navigated their challenges and the themes that emerged across these interviews. It was found that students frequently struggle with comparing themselves to peers and adjusting to the heightened responsibilities of university life, including navigating jobs and dealing with the influx of classwork. This challenge is compounded by the tendency of many students to anchor their identity in prior academic success, leaving them without the tools to navigate new academic difficulties. To adapt, interviewees described a shift in how they defined success, moving from grades as the marker of self-worth toward valuing the process of learning itself. Support systems played a pivotal role in this transition: peer relationships were often decisive in shaping whether students’ experiences were positive or negative.

These findings highlight the importance of community and identity development in fostering students' well-being and persistence in engineering programs. By integrating qualitative analysis with visual storytelling, this study explores how students navigate key transitional experiences. It further creates space for open conversations about mental health and for student-driven approaches that foster belonging and cultural transformation in engineering education.

Keywords: Students with Disabilities, Undergraduate, Student Diversity