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Black is Gold: The Importance of Racial Identity to Black Undergraduate Students in Engineering.

Authors :
Gaskins, Whitney
Askarian, Samieh
Source :
Proceedings of the ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition; 2022, p1-12, 12p
Publication Year :
2022

Abstract

Black men and women continue to be underrepresented and underserved in Engineering. In current engineering literature, the focus for Black students is primarily about preparedness, sense of belonging and motivation. Few studies explore the importance of racial identity and its impact on students as they matriculate through engineering programs. Researchers tend to focus on the importance of identity organizations but not the importance of identity in engineering culture. The purpose of this study is to understand the importance of racial identity on Black students matriculating through engineering programs. This paper explores a subset of questions that were asked during a larger qualitative study to understand how important racial and ethnic identity is to Black students in engineering. During semi-structured interviews, students were asked to rank distinct aspects of their identity. We found that 100% of the participants ranked their racial or ethnic identity as number one or two as their top identifier. This paper explores the differences between how Black men and women rank their identities. Of the eleven students that were interviewed in the study only one student mentioned engineering as an important identity metric. Our results suggest that engineering must do more to improve the racial climate and understand racial identity. Once engineering communities understand the importance of racial and ethnic identity the more inclusive the spaces can be that will help ensure participation and increase representation of Black students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
21535868
Database :
Complementary Index
Journal :
Proceedings of the ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Publication Type :
Conference
Accession number :
172834978