SHARE OF DOCTORATES EARNED BY WOMEN HAS FLAT-LINED

This month’s Databyte explores the trend in women’s share of doctoral degrees awarded over the last decade. In 2005, women’s share of total doctoral degrees awarded was 21%. It increased to its highest level at 25% in 2010 before dropping to 24% in 2012 and has remained at that level since then.

In absolute terms, the number of doctoral degrees awarded to women grew from 636 in 2005 to 1,211 in 2014 at an average annual rate of 8%, which is 2 percentage points higher than the rate at which the number of degrees awarded to men grew.

The data presented here are based on information provided by 400 engineering schools in the United States that participated in ASEE’s survey of engineering and engineering technology colleges.

NO CLEAR END TO DEBATE OVER UNBREAKABLE ENCRYPTION

Leaked White House documents indicate that the administration may be easing back from its previous stance that the government needs guarantees it can access encrypted data, The Hill newspaper reports. Privacy advocates, who include both Republican and Democratic lawmakers, the tech industry and civil liberties organizations, have used the leaks to launch a petition drive urging the president to endorse robust encryption, the paper says. Advocates say strong encryption, even if it hinders law enforcement, is the best defense against hackers, will help U.S. tech companies market their products overseas, and could set a pro-security example in a world where several countries – including China, India, France and the United Kingdom – are considering laws to weaken encryption. Law enforcement agencies argue that unbreakable encryption will keep data safe even when there’s a warrant to access it, which will give worrying cover to terrorists and criminals. California Democrat Ted Lieu, who has a computer science degree from Stanford, is one of those pushing for tough encryption, as is Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore. But Rhode Island Democrat Jim Langevin, cochair of the Congressional Cybersecurity Caucus, and Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., are among those who say the national security concerns trump the rationales for unbreakable encryption. The Hill says the debate appears to be far from settled.

POLS SEEK ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS RAISED BY THE GIG ECONOMY

A growing number of U.S. workers are, to use an established term, freelancers. It’s a work arrangement that’s been key to the success of many high-tech startups. Accordingly, the New York Times reports, many policymakers and politicians are making a pilgrimage to Silicon Valley to talk to tech executives on how best to classify and protect these workers. The article explains that Washington only took notice of this issue with the recent, swift rise of Uber, the app-run taxi service. Uber employs 4,000, but the 160,000 drivers it depends on to keep it running are classified as contractors and receive no benefits. Legal questions about job security and benefits have piqued the interest of policymakers. The Times article features entrepreneur Marco Zappacosta, whose startup, Thumbtack, matches freelance workers to possible gigs, including plumbers, yoga teachers, caterers and housecleaners. Zappacosta, 30, has exchanged emails with Sen. Mark R. Warner, D-Va., hosted a visit from Jeb Bush, the GOP presidential candidate, and led a group of freelancers to a meeting with the Small Business Administration at the White House. A new study commissioned by the Freelancers Union estimates that a third of the workforce, 53.7 million workers, do some freelance work. That’s 700,000 more than a year earlier.

III. THE K-12 REPORT

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A HOOK FOR PEOPLE PERSONS

Participation in Research Helps Socially Minded Undergraduates Stay the Course and Succeed

By Sara E. Branch, Anna Woodcock and William G. Graziano

Engineering research is critical to scientific discovery and technological innovation. Recognizing the need for career researchers, a number of agencies, including the National Science Foundation, are investing heavily in recruiting and retaining talented students. Despite these efforts, however, statistics indicate a continued need to reduce student attrition from engineering. Our work examined a particular population of students at risk for leaving engineering – those with a high interest in people – and the factors that can affect their persistence toward a career in engineering research.

Consider your interest in the following activities: watching a machine work and meeting a new neighbor. Do you find one more captivating than the other – or both? These questions capture interests in things versus people. Students scoring high in thing orientation are drawn to engineering because it aligns with their interests in things. However, many engineering students are high in both person and thing orientations. The impact of person orientation on interest in engineering is not clear, but research suggests that students scoring high on person orientation may be less likely to persist in engineering. Theories of person environment fit indicate that students’ experiences in undergraduate engineering programs and their beliefs about the professional engineering workplace might fail to satisfy their interest in people.

We were interested in how the undergraduate engineering environment could satisfy person oriented interests. We focused on the role of faculty encouragement and undergraduate research. Perceived encouragement from faculty members benefits students in numerous ways. It leads them to have more positive academic self-concepts, improves both their internal and external academic motivation, and increases students’ feelings of belonging. Faculty encouragement may particularly benefit person oriented engineering students for two reasons. First, encouragement is an interpersonal process and thus social by its very nature. Second, faculty members are likely to encourage students to become involved in the academic environment by participating in activities outside of class, offering greater opportunities for interpersonal engagement. In engineering, a valued academic activity is participation in undergraduate research. Students who conduct research are more likely to stay in engineering and show greater interest in engineering careers. For students high in person orientation, encouragement has the added potential benefit of motivating them to pursue undergraduate research.

Our study examined how person and thing orientations, perceived encouragement from faculty to participate in research, and students’ intentions to be involved in research affect undergraduates’ interest in an engineering research career. Some 292 students at a large public university completed an online survey of their person and thing orientations, perceptions of encouragement, interest in undergraduate research, and career goals. We then used an ordinary least squares (OLS) regression approach to simultaneously test two sequential mediators to explain the impact of person orientation on research career interests.

Our results showed that students who score higher in person orientation perceived greater faculty encouragement to participate in research, which in turn increased their interest in being involved in undergraduate research. The greater the intentions to be involved in research as a student, the greater the interest in pursuing a career in engineering research. Neither encouragement nor intentions to be involved in research alone explained the association between person orientation and career interests.

Students high in both person and thing orientations may be ideally suited for a career in engineering because they are likely to possess both critical interpersonal and technical skills. However, they may leave engineering in favor of careers that are better able to satisfy their people-focused interests. Our findings suggest that encouragement from faculty to participate in undergraduate research may improve the retention of these students. Faculty encouragement can serve as an external motivator that helps to direct person oriented engineering students toward participation in undergraduate research, which in turn may satisfy both person and thing orientations.

Sara E. Branch is an assistant professor of psychology at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Anna Woodcock is a social psychology researcher and lecturer at California State University San Marcos, and William G. Graziano is a professor of psychological sciences at Purdue University. This article was adapted from “Person Orientation and Encouragement: Predicting Interest in Engineering Research,” published in the April 2015 issue of the Journal of Engineering Education.

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VI. COMMUNITY ANNOUNCEMENTS

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HERE’S THE LINE- UP FOR NEXT MONTH’S PRISM MAGAZINE

HEALTHCARE: Engineering schools are getting into healthcare from the standpoint of systems and industrial engineering. Teams of undergraduates and graduate students pair up with hospital clinicians and mentors to improve effectiveness, efficiency, and quality of care in one of society’s most complicated and expensive delivery systems.

TRUCKS: EPA’s ambitious fuel-economy rules for big trucks challenge engineering researchers to reexamine engines, aerodynamics, tires, size and weight – as well as an integration of all these components. Sidebar: How West Virginia University engineers caught Volkswagen cheating on diesel emissions.

GLOBAL: Can you teach a course in several countries – oceans apart – simultaneously? The University of Southern California and partner schools show how it’s done.

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