Publications and Research
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
8-23-2022
Abstract
Colleges across the United States must produce more engineering graduates in order to keep up with demands in the engineering workforce. Population trends indicate that women and minorities are highly underrepresented in the STEM fields therefore recruitment and retention of these populations is critical to closing the predicted gap in the workforce. Perkins Peer Advisement is a grant funded program at New York City College of Technology (City Tech) committed to increasing enrollment and retention of nontraditional students in engineering technology programs. Program activities include professional development, mentoring, and community outreach. Participants of the program have higher retention rates than the average reported for these majors. For female students, the one-year retention rates were 85% for participants compared to about 51% for all female students in fall 2017 and 78% for participants compared to about 60% for all female students in fall 2018. For Hispanic students, the one-year retention rates were 52% for participants compared to about 44% for all Hispanic students in fall 2017 and 76% for participants compared to about 46% for all Hispanic students in fall 2018. The program provides a successful model for mentoring, recruiting, and retaining females and minorities in STEM; empowers students with the resources to succeed academically and professionally, provides positive role models, and engages participants in community outreach.
Comments
Villatoro, M. (2022, August), Retaining Diverse Groups in STEM Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN. https://peer.asee.org/41545, © 2022 American Society for Engineering Education.