Exploring faculty perceptions of students characteristics at hispanic serving institutions

Abstract

The creation of a diverse STEM workforce has been the target of multiple initiatives that seek to broaden the participation of underrepresented minorities. Hispanic/Latinx students represent a small fraction of undergraduate engineering students, and more than half obtain their undergraduate degrees from Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs). Focusing efforts at these institutions has the potential to increase significantly the representation of the Latinx population in engineering. This study is part of a broader effort to identify needs and successes at existing HSIs by actively engaging with engineering educators through the use of design thinking methodologies. This paper aims to further the understanding of how educators at HSIs perceive their undergraduate students, including their assets and needs. Thirty-six engineering educators from 13 HSIs in Arizona, Florida, New Mexico, and Texas attended one of two workshops in the spring of 2018. Participants engaged in individual and group activities that helped them reflect on their students and actively design an educational innovation for their institution, using information previously gathered through interviews with students. Qualitative analysis of the data across the thirty-six educators at both workshops identified differences between how instructors describe characteristics of Latinx engineering students across regions and instructor type. The overall findings provide a set of unique characteristics of students at HSIs that can serve as the foundation for future research and future educational efforts to increase the representation of Latinx students in engineering.