Collegiate service engagement correlations with engineering job selection and satisfaction

Abstract

Curricular and co-curricular service programs are becoming more common in engineering education. For some students, these experiences align with preexisting desires to use engineering to help others; for others it instills these expectations for one’s career. There has been a lack of research on the long-term impacts of these service experiences on engineers’ career pathways, including satisfaction with an ability to help others through one’s career. A survey asked engineering alumni to describe characteristics of their most and least satisfying jobs with respect to an ability to help others or society. Results showed that for individuals in their first job since graduation, undergraduate collegiate service weakly correlated with an ability to help others as a motivator for job selection, and graduate level collegiate service moderately correlated with satisfaction with an ability to help others through one’s job. The results point to the formative effect that service can have on career aspirations and perceptions, but also highlight the complexity of these issues and the need for more in-depth and nuanced assessments of the effects of collegiate experiences on post-collegiate pathways.