Broadening Participation: A Report on a Series of Workshops Aimed at Building Community and Increasing the Number of Women and Minorities in Engineering Design

Despite some progress in increasing the numbers of women and minorities in engineering over the past 30 years, their full participation in the discipline has yet to be achieved, particularly in engineering academia. One cause is the "leaky pipeline"; even after women and minorities choose to major in engineering, they drop out at rates higher than their counterparts along all career stages (undergraduate school, graduate school, tenure-track, etc.). Their small numbers creates isolation that has the unfortunate risks of struggle, less professional success, less sense of personal belonging, and less retention. Our hypothesis is that building a community that provides networking and support, opportunities for collaboration, and professional development, will lead to greater career success, personal fulfillment and professional happiness, retention, and greater participation/contribution from women and minorities. The authors have been conducting a series of workshops aimed at broadening participation of women and other minorities within the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Design Engineering Division (DED). This paper reports on the activities and results of the workshop series. Pre-workshop survey data indicated a clear opportunity to address the unmet needs of underrepresented groups in the ASME DED. Post-workshop survey data showed success in attendee satisfaction with feelings of inclusion and community, professional skill building, and the prospect of future workshops held by the committee. A follow-up impact assessment survey showed that the workshops have led to greater participation in DED activities, new positive connections within the DED community, and positive feelings regarding their communication/collaboration abilities, self confidence, level of comfort, feelings of inclusion, professional goals, leadership abilities, and skill sets. While these results are encouraging, the committee feels strongly that greater success in broadening the participation of underrepresented groups in engineering would be possible by sharing our strategies and successes, and learning from others with similar experience creating communities within the many engineering disciplines represented in ASEE. Introduction The goal of the Broadening Participation committee is to develop, implement and oversee new and existing activities aimed at broadening the participation of women and underrepresented minorities in the activities of the Design Engineering Division of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. The committee was formed in the fall of 2008 by seven founding members, and has since grown to ten members, with interest from even more wanting to join and make a difference. The efforts of the committee toward broadening the participation of women and underrepresented minorities have involved a number of activities, the largest of which has been the annual workshops held at the American Society of Mechanical Engineers International Design Engineering Technical Conferences (ASME IDETC). This paper provides a detailed report on workshop activities, including a description of each workshop topic, as well as activities that were conducted within each workshop. In addition, the results of survey assessments are presented and analyzed. Four workshops have been held to date, all occurring the day prior to the annual ASME IDETC meeting. Participation has been by application. The workshop topics were selected based on their usefulness to the professional development for the target audience. The first was on Negotiation Strategies, the second on Networking Skills and Strategies, the third on Navigating and Leading Change, and the fourth on Communicating Technical Ideas. Each workshop was conducted by a professional consultant, supported by funds provided by ASME. The National Science Foundation (NSF) provided funding for the participation of graduate students and postdocs. The ASME IDETC attracts up to 1100 attendees from all over the world. The proportion of majority-to-minority and male-to-female attendees at the conference reflects the overall low representation of minorities and women in the mechanical engineering profession. Workshop attendees develop crucial skills to help them negotiate, network, navigate and lead change, and communicate. In addition, connecting attendees within the design community early in their careers, will give them opportunities to support each other throughout their careers. Our hypothesis is that building a community that provides networking and support, opportunities for collaboration, and professional development, will lead to greater career success, personal fulfillment and professional happiness, retention, and greater participation/contribution from women and minorities, as suggested in the literature.