Page 60 - Educating the Engineer of 2020: Adapting Engineering Education to the New Century

Educating the Engineer of 2020: Adapting Engineering Education to the New Century
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/11338.html

GUIDEPOSTS TO THE FUTURE 43

Diversity
In her comments at the summit, Shirley Ann Jackson stressed the
need to broaden the participation of underrepresented minorities in
engineering and cited a BEST (2004) report that examined programs
across the country that have been working to increase diversity in STEM
fields and recognized that there were common characteristics at success-
ful institutions. These characteristics are summarized in Table 4-1.
A particular example of a program to increase diversity is one devel-
oped by the Georgia Institute of Technology (May and Chubin, 2003).
In cooperation with historically black colleges and universities (HBCU)
in the Atlanta area, Georgia Tech has created a dual-degree engineering
program that is graduating 30 to 40 African American engineers per
year out of a total of about 130 African American engineering graduates
each year (best in the United States for a non-HBCU). Another pro-
gram is the partnership between the University of California at Los
Angeles (UCLA) and the Hewlett-Packard (HP) Company to deploy

TABLE 4-1 Design Principles to Expand Higher Education Capacity

Principle Evidence

Institutional leadership Commitment to inclusiveness across the campus
community
Targeted recruitment Investing in and executing a feeder system, K-12
Engaged faculty Developing student talent as a rewarded faculty outcome
Personal attention Addressing, through mentoring and tutoring, the
learning needs of each student
Peer support Providing student interaction opportunities that build
support across cohorts and allegiance to institution,
discipline, and profession
Enriched research Providing beyond-the-classroom hands-on opportunities
and summer internships that connect experience to the
world of work
Bridging to the next level Building institutional relationships that help students and
faculty to envision pathways to milestones and career
development
Continuous evaluation Ongoing monitoring of process and outcomes that guide
program adjustments to heighten impact

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