STUDENTS ENTERING AND EXITING THE ENGINEERING PIPELINE IDENTIFYING KEY DECISION POINTS AND TRENDS

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1 STUDENTS ENTERING AND EXITING THE ENGINEERING PIPELINE IDENTIFYING KEY DECISION POINTS AND TRENDS Michelle J. Johnson 1 and Sheri D. Sheppard 2 Abstract-Recent data suggest that the United States is unable to meet the demand for individuals well prepared to contribute to science, math, and engineering with their native workforce. Low participation rates of females and underrepresented minorities in these fields are major factors contributing to this situation. This study tracked the progress of the high school class of 1990 through the engineering pipeline, specifically focusing on the progress of female and underrepresented minority students within the class. This paper presents data that quantify their progress. Points along the pipeline where the participation rates of students dropped significantly are identified as critical decision points. Factors contributing to dropping rates at these points are discussed with the intention of identifying opportunities to improve engineering education. Index Terms-Engineering pipeline, females, participation rates in engineering, underrepresented minorities. INTRODUCTION Rapid technological advancements in society increase the need for individuals well prepared to contribute to science, math, and engineering (SME) knowledge, application, and innovation. Recent data suggest that the United States (US) is unable to meet the demand for such individuals with their native workforce [1]. Low participation rates of females and underrepresented minorities (Blacks, Hispanics, and American Indians) in SME fields are major factors contributing to this situation. Lack of peer support, role models, and adequate preparation are frequently cited by students and identified in the literature as barriers to the successful recruitment and retention of many of these individuals [3,4,7]. In addition, the existence of certain SME cultural and pedagogical norms discourage, isolate, and ultimately turn off many willing and qualified female and minority students [2-4,7]. The engineering pipeline is a common metaphor that describes the progress of students through the educational system that leads to a degree in engineering. Some researchers argue that the pipeline metaphor does not adequately describe the choices students make along the way to becoming an engineer and advocate using the path metaphor [4]. Although, we agree that the pipeline metaphor is limited, we use the image to organize our data because it is a familiar concept to most engineering faculty and it is sufficient for giving an overview of the participation rates of students. This paper examines trends in the participation rates of students entering into and journeying through the engineering pipeline. We tracked the progress of a class of high school students through the engineering pipeline while specifically focusing on the progress of female and underrepresented minority students. Our analysis describes these students participation rates at each stage in the engineering pipeline (status quo) and highlights reasons why some of them progress through the stages and others do not. This is certainly not the first study to track the progress of various groups of students in engineering; many research studies have examined the participation rates of underrepresented minority and female students in both science and engineering fields [2-8]. However, extracting data that covers only engineering trends can be difficult from these studies as it is often buried under the extensive data and information provided and is thus, less digestable for engineering faculty. This current paper extracts and interprets data on engineering student travels through the engineering pipeline in a concise manner and is intended to inform engineering faculty about the demongraphics of the engineering pipeline. This data extraction and interpretation of student demographics in engineering education was a mini-study undertaken in support of a larger project on engineering education called Taking Stock: a look at engineering education at the turn of the century and beyond [9] being sponsored by Carnegie Foundation for Advancement of Teaching. In addition, the data treatment presented here sets the stage for a subsequent paper in which we identify and map the roles of key stakeholders acting along the engineering pipeline at these decision points to improve the numbers of females and underrepresented minority students selecting and persisting in engineering [10]. METHOD Entry into the engineering pipeline occurs as early as elementary school and a successful exit occurs with the receipt of a bachelor s, master s or doctoral degree in engineering. Many researchers show that students actions before high school, especially those made in middle school (typically, grades six through eight), affect their ability to successfully progress through the pipeline [2,4,6,11]. Our analysis focuses on a subset of the pipeline, the progress 1 Michelle Johnson, Ph.D., Stanford University, Center for Design Research, 560 Panama Mall, Stanford, CA 94306, johnsonm@stanfordalumni.org 2 Sheri D. Sheppard, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Stanford University, sheppard@cdr.stanford.edu S3C-13

2 from high school (HS) to college graduation with a baccalaureate degree in engineering. We began our study with HS graduation because students choices made at this juncture greatly influence the numbers of engineers in the workforce. For example, Adelman [4] indicated that students with intentions of obtaining an engineering baccalaureate degree who decided to begin their postsecondary engineering career in a 2-year institution instead of a 4-year institution were more likely to not persist toward the degree; only twenty percent transfered to a 4-year institution. We concluded our investigation with graduation from a fouryear undergraduate institution with a bachelor s degree in engineering because factors that influence students decisions to continue on for higher engineering degrees were examined elsewhere [12]. Pipeline Structure We divide our subset of the engineering pipeline into five decision points, which are mapped onto the pipeline shown in Figure 1. Beginning with senior year in HS, the average HS class makes five major decisions: (a) graduate from high school; (b) go on to college either at a two-year or a fouryear postsecondary institution; (c) enroll in a four-year college or university; (d) enroll in an engineering program leading to a bachelor s degree; and (e) graduate with a baccalaureate degree in engineering. These decisions occur at the end of several stages in the pipeline: at the end senior year in high school (Stage 1), after HS graduation (Stage 2) but before enrolling in an institution that grants a bachelor s degree in engineering (Stage 3), during the undergraduate years at four-year institutions (Stage 4 and 5). Successful navigation of decisions a through e leads to Stage 6, the receipt of a bachelor s degree in engineering. FIGURE 1 A SUBSET OF THE ENGINEERING PIPELINE AND MAPPING OF THE FIVE DECISIONS (A-E) STUDENTS MUST SUCCESSFULLY NAVIGATE TO ATTAIN A BACHELOR S DEGREE IN ENGINEERING. S3C-14 Data The primary source of data used for this investigation was the National Science Foundation s (NSF) publication, Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities in Science and Engineering: 2000 [2]. The unique presentation of high school data for ages 25 to 29 in this document enabled us to reconstruct the progress of high school students in the class of 1990, through this section of the pipeline. Other data sources [2-7], some of which were based on the U.S. Department of Education's Completions Survey, conducted annually by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) as part of the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), and the Survey of Earned Doctorates, conducted annually for the National Science Foundation (NSF) and four other Federal agencies, were used to supplement the information in the NSF document. The sources for the data tables used are listed in the Appendix. The pipeline data were organized to reflect the progress of the class of 1990 as a whole unit, as well as by its gender and ethnic subpopulations. The ethnic categories used are those designated under the old labels and standards where racial/ethnic groups were identified as White (non-hispanic), Black (non-hispanic), Hispanic, Asian (or Pacific Islander) and, American Indian (or Alaskan Native) [2]. The old standards were used because all available data used in current data references were organized around these standards. We used four strategies to examine the progress of the HS class of 1990 and its associated subpopulations. We recorded, (1) the number of students in the class (by gender and by ethnicity) who made decisions a through e ; (2) the percentage of students who made each decision and transitioned from one stage to the next; (3) the percentage of students from the original populations in Stage one who reached subsequent decision points; and, (4) the percent distribution of students who reached each decision across the gender and ethnic subpopulations. We verified that reconstructed data accurately represented the progress of an average HS school class by comparing the derived percentages and trends at each decision with published findings [3-7,9-12]. The selection of the HS class of 1990 was not arbitrary. It was selected as the starting point for Stage 1 because by the year 1997 (the most recent year with complete on college graduation rates, as presented in [3]) almost all class members who were going to graduate with a BS in engineering would have completed their degree. Key Assumptions for Data Reconstruction In reconstructing the data for the class of 1990 in each of the five stages, several key assumptions were made. In Stage 1, the US Bureau of Census Data for the population of 25 to 29 year olds in 1997 were used to derive our HS class of 1990 [2]; we assumed that the population and demographics of this group in 1990, when they were 18- to 22-years old, was

3 the same as in Furthermore, this population data for 18- to 22-years old represented approximately five classes of HS students; dividing the population by five, gives us an average starting population for the HS class of In Stages 2 and 3, from the reported percentages for Whites, Blacks, and Hispanics who graduated HS and went onto college, we assumed that the percentage of Asians who graduated from HS and go to college was comparable to Whites, and the percentage of American Indians was similar to that of Blacks [2]. In Stage 4, first-time undergraduate enrollments at four-year institutions were used for the fall of 1990; the number of freshmen starting later in the academic year was assumed to be insignificant [5]. In Stage 5, the number of first-time undergraduates who enrolled full-time in an engineering program at four-year institutions in 1990 was derived from raw data describing the numbers of firsttime undergraduates who had earned degrees from an engineering program at two-year and four-year institutions in 1990 and the number of first-time undergraduates who enrolled full-time in an engineering program at two-year institutions in 1990 [5]. Wherever possible, the data reported in this study excluded students who reported their resident status as temporary. If they were included, we considered their cumulative effect negligible. RESULTS From the data, we describe major trends observed in the participation rates of students in the subset of engineering pipeline under study. First, we identify trends that affect all students, then we present data highlighting the differences between female and male participation rates and the differences between underrepresented minority students and Asian and White students participation rates. All Students Table I reports the progress of all students in the high school class of 1990 who made decisions a through e. Their progress was charted in terms of the percentage of the original class population of Stage 1. The HS senior class of 1990 consisted of approximately 3,773,800 () students, 87.3% of whom graduated with a HS diploma. More than half (57.5%) of the class went on to get some level of postsecondary education. Only 27.6% of the HS class made decisions a through c and thus, matriculated at an institution where students were most likely to attain a baccalaureate degree in engineering. The students participating at Stage 5 represented only 2.3% of the starting HS class. Furthermore, the Table 1 data indicate that only 1.6% of the population of students (about 58,920) in a HS cohort graduated with a bachelor s degree in engineering. The graduation rates of this class was similar to the graduation rates reported in the Science and Engineering Indicators 2000 [3], which showed that 1.6% of the US resident population over 24 years of age earned a bachelor s degrees in engineering in TABLE I THE PROGRESS OF ALL STUDENTS IN THE HIGH SCHOOL CLASS OF 1990 THROUGH TO GRADUATION WITH A BACHELORS DEGREE IN ENGINEERING. NOTE: *PERCENTAGE OF TOTAL IN STATE 1 (TOTAL NUMBERS IN THOUSANDS) All Students * Stage 1 HS Senior Class (3773.8) Stage 2 HS Graduates 87.3% ( ) Stage 3 College Goers 57.1% (2156.7) Stage 4 Enrollers in four-year 27.6% (1042.4) Enrollers in Engineering 2.28% Stage 5 Stage 6 Programs Engineering graduates with a bachelors degree (85.95) 1.56% (58.92) Figure 2 graphically depicts the activity at decision points in terms of the percentage of students (from previous stage) who transitioned onto the next stage. The greatest decline in the numbers of students in the pipeline occurred at decision point d, where only 8.3% of those enrolling in a four-year college enrolled in an engineering program. These data also show that although many students enrolling in four-year institutions did not enroll in engineering programs (Stage 5), more than two-thirds (68.6%) of them that did, graduated (decision e ) and received a bachelor s degree in engineering. Findings from the High School and Beyond Sophomore Cohort Study (HS&B/So) [4], a study that followed a HS cohort from 1982, found that 59.0% of those who reached the threshold of engineering (defined as having completed three required engineering courses), earned a bachelor s degree by age 30. This study also reported 9.6% of the cohort reached the threshold of engineering but only 7.9% of them enrolled in engineering FIGURE 2 STUDENT ACTIVITY AT DECISIONS X IN TERMS OF THE % OF STUDENTS (FROM THE PREVIOUS STAGE) WHO TRANSITIONED ONTO THE NEXT STAGE. S3C-15

4 programs. Our investigation reports that 8.3% of students in our HS cohort who enrolled in four-year postsecondary institutions enrolled in engineering (decision d ). These numbers are similar when we consider the fact that the threshold population in the HS&B/So study included students enrolling in both postsecondary two-year and fouryear engineering programs. By Gender Table II presents the class data in Table I in terms of its male and female subpopulations. In the HS of class of 1990, there were slightly more males (50.2%) than females (49.8%). Males and females progressed through to Stage 4 at similar rates. In similar percentages, they positively negotiated decisions a through c and enroll in four-year institutions. Figure 3 graphically depicts the activity at decision points in terms of the percentage of female and male students (from previous stage) who transitioned onto the next stage. Consistent with national gender trends [3-5], Figure 3 graphically indicates that females were more likely than the males to not only graduate from HS (88.9% compared to 85.8%) but also go on to some college (66.8% compared to 64.6%). In general, females (49.4%) tended to enroll fulltime in four-year institutions at slightly higher rate than males (47.2%). These percentages represent 29.3% of females and 25.9% of males in the eligible population (see Stage 4 in Table II). TABLE II THE PROGRESS OF STUDENTS IN THE AVERAGE HIGH SCHOOL CLASS OF 1990 THROUGH TO GRADUATION WITH A BACHELOR S DEGREE IN ENGINEERING, BY GENDER. NOTE: *PERCENTAGE OF TOTAL IN STAGE 1 (TOTAL NUMBERS IN THOUSANDS) tracked the HS class of 1982 indicated a 20 percentage difference at this stage (58.8% of males students who reached the threshold, received an engineering degree FIGURE 3 STUDENT ACTIVITY AT THE DECISION POINTS IN TERMS OF THE % OF MALES AND FEMALES (FROM THE PREVIOUS STAGE) WHO MADE THE DECISION X AND THUS TRANSITIONED ONTO THE NEXT STAGE. compared to only 42.0% of females). We believe that the higher retention rate for females in the average HS class of 1990 reflects the improvements in female enrollment and graduation rates shown from 1990 to 1996 [1,8]. Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Stage 4 Stage 5 Stage 6 HS Senior Class HS Graduates College Goers Enrollers in Four-year Enrollers in Engineering Programs Engineering Graduates with a Bachelor s Degree Males * (1894.0) 80.0% (1625.0) 54.9% (1040.0) 25.9% (491.0) 3.7% (70.5) 2.6% (49.7) Females (1879.0) 90.0% (1671.0) 59.4% (1116.3) 29.3% (351.3) 0.8% (15.5) 0.5% (9.2) The number of females in the engineering pipeline began to decline at decision point d where students decided whether to enroll in an engineering program. Compared to 14.3% of male students, only 2.8% of female students who enrolled in four-year institutions (Stage 4) chose to enroll in an engineering program. The data indicated that more than 59.6% of the females who enrolled in engineering graduated with a bachelor s degree in engineering (decision e ). The participation rate of females at this stage was approximately 10 percentage points less than their male counterparts. The HS&B/So study [4], which By Ethnicity Table III presents the class data in Table I in terms of its ethnic subpopulations. The average HS class of 1990 ethnic representation was as follows: 68.0% White, 8.9% Asian, and 27.6% underrepresented minorities (13.1% Black, 13.6% Hispanic, and 0.8% American Indian). Table III reports that Blacks, Hispanics, and American Indians were less likely than Whites and Asians to graduate high school and go on to college. Forty-seven percent (47.0%) of both Blacks and American Indians, 33.0% of Hispanics, compared to 65.0% of both Whites and Asians went on to get some postsecondaryeducation (Stage 3). Activity levels of the various ethnic subpopulations at the decisions points are presented in Table IV. The numbers in this table are percentages of the subpopulations at the previous state who transitioned into the next stage. For all ethnic groups, the greatest decline in the number of students in the engineering pipeline occurred in decision d, between Stages 4 and 5. Of those students who enrolled in undergraduate four-year institutions, underrepresented minorities were least likely to enroll in engineering. As shown in Table IV, in decision d compared to Whites (9.1%) and Asians (14.7%), only 6.4% to 7.1% S3C-16

5 underrepresented minority students enrolled in engineering programs. Once enrolled, Blacks were the least likely to graduate with a bachelor s degree in engineering (31.7%). Findings from a study reported by The National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering (NACME) [7], whose focus is on tracking recruitment and retention rates by race/ethnicity, showed similarities with our data. NACME found only 35.6% of freshmen from underrepresented minority groups who enroll in engineering graduate. In comparison, 68.4% of non-minority students (Whites and Asians combined) who enroll in engineering graduate. They also indicated that Hispanics were retained at the rate of 44.5%, Blacks at 32.3%, and American Indians at 34%. The NACME numbers compare favorably with the data reported in decision e of Table IV. Between 0.5% and 0.6% of the Blacks, Hispanics, and American Indians in an average HS school class received bachelor s degrees in engineering compared to 1.8% Whites and 3.7% Asians. Science and Engineering Indicators 2000 [3] reported that in 1996 a slightly higher percentage of 24 year-olds in ethnic subpopulations received bachelor s degrees in engineering, 1.7% of Whites, 4.2% of Asians, and between 0.6% to 0.75% of underrepresented minorities. TABLE III THE PROGRESS OF STUDENTS IN THE AVERAGE HIGH SCHOOL CLASS OF 1990 THROUGH TO GRADUATION WITH A BACHELOR S DEGREE IN ENGINEERING, BY ETHNICITY. NOTES: 1. *PERCENTAGE OF TOTAL IN STAGE 1 (TOTAL NUMBERS IN THOUSANDS) 2. **IN STAGES 2 AND 3, FROM THE REPORTED PERCENTAGES FOR WHITES, BLACKS, AND HISPANICS WHO GRADUATED HS AND WENT ONTO COLLEGE, WE ASSUMED THAT THE PERCENTAGE OF ASIANS WHO GRADUATED FROM HS AND GO TO COLLEGE WAS COMPARABLE TO WHITES, AND THE PERCENTAGE OF AMERICAN INDIANS WAS SIMILAR TO THAT OF BLACKS [2]. Whites Asians Blacks Hispanics American Indian Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Stage 4 Stage 5 Stage 6 HS Senior Class* HS Graduates** College Goers** Enrollers in Four-year Enrollers in Engineering Programs Engineering Graduates with a Bachelor s Degree (2564.2) 94.0% (2382.1) 65.0% (1655.6) 31.0% (795.6) 2.8% (72.8) 1.8% (46.2) (169.4) 94.0% (157.4) 65.0% (109.4) 30.1% (51.0) 4.4% (7.5) 3.7% (6.3) (495.4) 88.0% (430.5) 47.0% (231.2) 23.2% (114.9) 1.5% (7.4) 0.5% (2.3) (513.4) 63.0% (317.3) 33.0% (171.0) 14.5% (74.29) 1.0% (5.3) 0.5% (2.8) (31.4) 88.0% (27.3) 47% (14.7) 20.9% (6.6) 1.4% (0.4) 0.6% (0.2) TABLE IV DATA FOR THE BAR PLOT IN FIGURE 4. NUMBERS ARE PERCENTAGES (%). Decision Amer. Whites Asians Blacks Hisp. X Indians X = a X = b X = c X = d X = e DISCUSSION The results indicate that there are three major decision points where most students exit the engineering pipeline. At these points, students must make decisions whether to enroll fulltime in a four-year undergraduate institution (point c ), enroll full-time in an engineering program (point d ), and graduate from engineering (point e ). The following discussion looks at these three pivotal decision points and offers some reasons for the significant reduction in numbers. Decision Point C: Enrolling in a Four-year Institution The decision to enroll in a four-year undergraduate institution is a critical point where most underrepresented minorities tend to leave the engineering pipeline. Blacks, Hispanics, and American Indians are more likely than Whites and Asians to attend a two-year rather than a fouryear institution [2]. Despite relatively high high school graduation rates of each ethnic subpopulation that ranged from 68% to 94%, each group s preparation for college differs. To varying degrees, these differences affect these students desire to attend a four-year undergraduate institution full-time and their perceived ability to successfully compete at that level [3-5,8]. For example, lowered expectations and lack of encouragement from K-12 teachers and counselors often result in more minority students being placed in less rigorous academic environments that do not adequately prepare them to compete at a four-year institution [6,8]. In addition, HS preparation and lack of finances are two key factors that cause the differences in the enrollment rates between underrepresented minority students and other populations. Underrepresented minority students typically have lower socio-economic statuses than their White and Asian counterparts and have more limited access to financing for postsecondary education. Thus, two-year junior and community colleges become attractive, low cost alternatives to more expensive four-year degree programs [1-3,6]. Unfortunately, the decision to go first to a two-year S3C-17

6 postsecondary institution becomes another critical decision point for students in the engineering pipeline. Enrollment data indicate that the majority of students, especially underrepresented minority students, who make the decisions to begin their postsecondary education at two-year institutions do not transfer to four-year institutions with engineering programs leading to a bachelor s degree [1]; only about one in five students who graduate with an engineering bachelor s degree started at a two-year program [3]. Decision Point D: Enrolling in An Engineering Program The decision to enroll in an engineering program is a critical point where more female than male students and more underrepresented minorities than Whites and Asians students exit the engineering pipeline. Findings from the HS&B/So study [4] indicate that although 10.4% of all freshmen report their intention to major in engineering, only 63.4% of them reach the threshold. The study offered several reasons why students who reach the threshold did not enroll. Some did not enroll because (1) they were not enrolled in an institution that supported a bachelor s degree in engineering; (2) they realized that they did not have sufficient math and science preparation; (3) they were disillusioned about engineering and chose it for the wrong reasons; and/or, (4) they realized engineering was not for them. Females were less likely to abandon their intentions to enroll in engineering than male students because of poor grades or lack of math or science preparation. Most often, female students realized that engineering was not for them or they chose it for the wrong reasons [4,8]. Underrepresented minority students often chose not to enroll in engineering because engineering was no longer of interest to them, they had conceptual difficulty with one or more science, math or engineering subjects, or they had poor preparation in math and science [4,8]. Stereotype threat (battling the belief that they do not belong in engineering), lack of peer support, and lack of role models are three additional factors that deter female and underrepresented minority students from enrolling in engineering programs [6, 8]. Decision Point E: Graduating with a Bachelor s Degree in Engineering The decision to persist and graduate with an engineering degree is another critical period where females (more than male) and underrepresented minorities (more than Whites and Asians) exit the engineering pipeline. Many of the reasons cited for low participation rates at decision point c explain participation rates at decision point e. Underrepresented minorities and females tend to leave the engineering pipeline because the engineering discipline dynamics and rituals were not welcoming or supportive, a belief which is fueled by their perception of the lack of faculty interest and encouragement, the absence of faculty role models, and the absence of peer support (male support for females and majority support for minorities) [4,8]. These negative experiences undermine the confidence of these students, affect their performance and interactions with faculty and fuel feelings of not belonging and disharmony. Studies indicate that due to low proficiency in math and science, HS graduates who enroll in engineering majors are often under-prepared for the engineering curricula [3,9]. Proficiency in math and science for twelfth-graders differ between male and female students and underrepresented minority and Whites/Asians students [3]. In 1996, studies report that in math, 37% of both White and Asians students reach the top proficiency levels (levels 4 and 5), while only about 14% of underrepresented minority students attain top levels [3]. In science 25% of both White and Asians students reach level 3 (the highest level), while only 8% of underrepresented minority students reach this same level. Since math and science profiency is strongly correlated to preparation for the engineering curricula, this underpreparation results in poor performance and students unselecting engineering. Despite this under-prepation, unlike males and underrepresented minorities, many females do not leave the engineering pipeline because of inability to complete the work of the discipline but because of disillusionment with the major and because the demands of the discipline conflicted with their future plans (family and lifestyle) [4,8]. CONCLUSIONS By reconstructing the progress of an average HS class of 1990, we were able to describe the students participation rates at each stage in a subset of the engineering pipeline from HS graduation to reception of a bachelor s degree. Our findings indicated that there were three critical decision points where students participation rates, especially those for female and underrepresented minority students drop significantly. At these decision points students make decisions to enroll full-time in four-year undergraduate institutions, enroll full-time in engineering programs, and graduate from engineering programs with bachelor s degrees. Studies indicate that insufficient HS math and science preparation and insufficient funding were two key factors that reduce underrepresented minority students enrollment in four-year institutions and engineering (decision point c ). In contrast, disillusionment with engineering and lack of interest in the potential associated lifestyle were common reasons deterring females from enrolling in engineering programs (decision point d ). The presence of negative stereotypes and/or engineering discipline dynamics and rituals were made engineering programs seem unsupportive. In addition, the perceived lack of faculty contact, role models, and peer support were described as key factors that caused both female and minority students who enrolled to not persist towards the completion of a bachelor s degree in engineering (decision point e ). For underrepresented minority students, financial factors played S3C-18

7 a key role in reducing participation rates at all three critical decision points. In a subsequent paper, we discuss actions being taken by stakeholders in engineering to reduce the number of females and underrepresented unselecting engineering at the various decisions points in Figure 1 [11]. ACKNOWLEDGMENT We would like to acknowledge our colleagues at the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching (Anne Colby Ph.D., William Sullivan Ph.D., Cheryl Richardson Ph.D., Kelly Macatangay and Sonia Gonzalez), and Atlantic Philanthropies (USA) Inc. for their contributions to this work. REFERENCES [1] Land of Plenty: Diversity as America s Competitive Edge in Science, Engineering and Technology, The Congressional Commission on the Advancement of Females and Minorities in Science and Engineering and Technology Development, Washington, DC, [2] Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disability in Science and Engineering: 2000, National Science Foundation, Arlington, VA, 2000 (NSF ). [3] Science and Engineering Indicators 2000, National Science Board, Arlington, VA, National Science Foundation, 2000 (NSB-00-1). [4] Adelman, C. Females and Men of the Engineering Path. A model for analysts of undergraduate careers US Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement, 1998, Washington, DC; US Government Printing Office. [5] Digest of Education Statistics 1999, National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement, NCES [6] Investing in Human Potential. Science and Engineering at the Crossroads. Matyas, ML and Malcom, SM (Eds.), 1998, Washington DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS Publication 91-39S). [7] Campbell, G. ----, NACME research letter, National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering (NACME), New York, 9(1), [8] Entry and Persistence of Women and Minorities in College Science and Engineering Education. Huang, G. Taddese, N, and E. Walter (Eds). 2000, Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education. National Center for Education Statistis.,NCES [9] Taking Stock: a look at engineering education at the turn of the century and beyond, report and additional data are on [10] Johnson, MJ. and Sheppard, S. Stakeholders roles in enabling underrepresented minority and female students remain in engineering. Submitted to Journal of Engineering Education, [11] Seymour, E and Hewitt, NM. Talking about leaving: Why undergraduates leave the sciences, 1997, Westview Press, Boulder, CO. [12] Sheppard, S. and Silva, MK. Descriptions of engineering: student and engineering practitioner perspectives. ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference, Reno, NV, APPENDIX Tables used from reference 2: Text table 1: Resident population of the United States, by sex, race/ethnicity, and age: 1997 [in thousands]) Text Table 1-2: Percentage of persons 25 years old and over who had completed high school, by race/ethnicity: April 1990 A: Table 1-2 Percentage of 25 to 29-year-olds who had completed high school by race/ethnicity and sex: March A: Table 1-4 Percentage of 25 to 29-year-olds high school completers with some college by race/ethnicity and sex: March A: Table 1-6 Total and full-time enrollment of first-time, first-year undergraduate students at all institutions, by sex and race/ethnicity: fall A: Table 1-11 Total and full-time enrollment of first-time, first-year students at four-year institution, by sex and race/ethnicity: fall A: Table 1-14 Total and full-time and first-year undergraduate enrollment in engineering programs by sex and race/ethnicity: A: Table 2-1 Associate s degrees by race/ethnicity and field: A: Table 2-2 Associate s degrees by sex and field: A: table 2-3 Associate s degrees in science and engineering by race/ethnicity, sex, and field: 1996 A: Table 2-8 Bachelor s degrees in science and engineering by field, citizenship, and race/ethnicity: A: Table 2-9 Percentage distribution of bachelor s degrees in science and engineering to US citizens and permanent residents, by field and race/ethnicity Tables used from reference 3: Text table 4-7: Ratio of total bachelor s degrees and S&E bachelor s degrees to the 24-year-old population, by sex and race/ethnicity: 1980 and Text Table 4-3: Percentage of high school graduates who report having taken mathematics and science courses, by sex: various years A: table 4-10 High school mathematics and science courses reported by entering freshmen, percentage by race/ethnicity: 1984 and 1998 A: table 4-11 Level of proficiency in mathematics and science among 12 th graders, percentage by race/ethnicity and sex: 1988 cohort in A: table 4-12 Percentage of freshmen reporting need for remedial work in science or mathematics, by intended major and sex: 1977, 1989, A: table 4-34 Earned associate s degrees, by field, race/ethnicity, and citizenship: (selected years) A: table 4-35 Earned bachelor s degrees, by field, race/ethnicity, and citizenship: (selected years) Tables used from reference 4: Table 4: Tripartite distribution of students on the engineering path, excluding students in two-year engineering tech programs and students still enrolled in undergraduate engineering programs at age 29/30. Table 24: Probable major indicated in grade 12 by HS&B/So students who later enrolled in four-year colleges, by engineering path status. Table 26: Contrast between men and females who abandoned their intention to major in engineering between the 12 th grade and early college experience. Tables used from reference 5: Table 216: Enrollment in postsecondary by age Table 254: Assoc. degrees, sex and field, Table 255: BS degrees, sex and field, Table 267: Assoc. degrees by racial/ethnic group, sex Table 270: BS degrees by racial/ethnic group, sex S3C-19