;)
But in the field of engineering, at least, there in diversifying the academic pipeline beyond white men.
The share of engineering bachelor鈥檚 degrees awarded to Black students . Women and Hispanic students fared better, but their respective percentages are still well below their . The shares of engineering professors who are Black or Hispanic and remain in the low single digits.
Many reasons have been cited for this lack of progress, including stereotypes, lack of exposure, limited role models and the that emphasize diverse hiring policies. But, as a , I believe there鈥檚 another culprit: poorly prepared professors. Unlike the other challenges, it happens to be a much easier problem for universities themselves to remedy.
Some progress 鈥� but not a lot
A quick look at the numbers shows there hasn鈥檛 been much to show for all the efforts to improve diversity of the engineering field.
For example, in 2011, 4.2% of engineering bachelor鈥檚 degrees . A decade later, 4.7% of degrees went to African American students.
Progress was better for women and Hispanic students, but the numbers are still far from proportional to demographics. In 2011, Hispanic students earned 8.5% of engineering degrees. That rose to 13.6% in 2021 鈥� versus the group鈥檚 .
Women similarly saw gains over the years, going from 18% to 24%. But 6 percentage points in 10 years doesn鈥檛 look as good when you consider that women make up over half of the population.
The situation is worse when you look at the share who become professors. In 2020, , the same share as 10 years earlier. The share of Hispanic engineering professors edged up to 3.9% from 3.7%.
Women fared slightly better, rising to 18.6% from 13.8%, but as noted, that鈥檚 still a pretty poor result from all those efforts to diversity the academy.
More broadly, there鈥檚 a deeper problem in engineering schools. Just 56% of engineering students , according to a 2021 report by the American Society for Engineering Education. That compares with . A National Science Foundation survey from the same year found that were working in a field related to their degree.
In other words, roughly a third of engineering students aren鈥檛 getting their degrees, and among those who do, around a third are switching careers 鈥� despite . While there鈥檚 limited data available on women or specific racial groups, I don鈥檛 think I鈥檓 going out on a limb to argue that the numbers for them look even worse.
Engineering teachers lack much teacher training
Among the reasons cited for this, I believe that the roles of teaching and learning haven鈥檛 received enough attention.
A growing body of research suggests that the to reverse trends of lower graduation rates and properly teach an increasingly diverse student body. And I believe this is especially true in STEM disciplines like engineering.
Engineering professors commonly have training in advanced technical areas, but in . This challenge of poor teaching preparedness is not limited to the engineering discipline, but the consequences are much worse, especially given the push to diversify STEM.
Effective teaching by promoting better understanding of the material and creating more student involvement in the learning process. When students are actively engaged, supported and motivated to learn, they are more likely to persist and complete their educational goals.
Teacher training for universities is starkly different than K-12 training. that teachers have a four-year bachelor鈥檚 degree in teacher education. The focus is less on content and more on implementing effective teaching practices. K-12 training includes lesson planning, and best practices for classroom management. There is also often a strong emphasis on .
Although some engineering doctoral students might gain teaching exposure through a graduate teaching assistantship, this experience is commonly limited to grading assignments and rarely includes course design and development.
To teach as a professor in colleges and universities, most accreditation boards 鈥� or about two semesters 鈥� in the topic area. Here, the focus is strictly on . No prior teaching experience or training is required.
As a result, newly minted doctoral graduates are . If they are lucky, they are provided with the latest available syllabus. However, new professors are typically unprepared to , , or . They are generally .
The field of K-12 teacher education has strategies to deal with these challenges. Continuing education and ongoing professional development keep both experienced and inexperienced teachers up to date on . These can include sharing gender pronouns, ensuring media is accessible, using inclusive language and offering diverse perspectives in teaching resources. And yet, keeping up with these changes can be daunting for new professors.
Teaching teachers to teach
But there is a solution: treating college-level teaching as a professional development opportunity.
Most colleges and universities offer professional development training for professors and other instructors who want to opt in to teacher training, but the programs often have at a level to make a substantial positive impact on student learning and engagement.
One way to change this is to invest in programs. This is a scholarly approach in which educators systematically study their teaching practices, student learning outcomes and the effectiveness of various teaching methods and strategies.
At Purdue University, we created a to help engineering graduate students around the world improve their teaching methods and share what they learned with others. In 2024, that reports the process and what we learned.
By providing comprehensive professional development opportunities , institutions can support their ongoing growth and development as effective educators, ultimately enhancing the quality of engineering education and preparing students for success in their future career.
And in turn, better-trained teachers will be better equipped to support students from diverse backgrounds and help those traditionally underrepresented in STEM.
This article is republished from under a Creative Commons license. Read the .
