Cultivating the Entrepreneurial Mindset through Design: Insights from Thematic Analysis of First-year Engineering Students' Reflections

Design is often specified as the characteristic that distinguishes engineers from professionals in other fields. This skill gives engineering graduates a competitive edge for pursuing diverse career paths and for responding to a range of social and technological needs throughout their careers. A component of this competitive edge includes affording students the opportunity to develop an entrepreneurial mindset (EM). According to the Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network (KEEN), the EM includes three dimensions: curiosity, creation of value, and connections. While entrepreneurship is frequently associated with commercialization and business, it is a critical but undervalued aspect of designing products and solutions in engineering. Over the past decade, various members of KEEN have embedded the EM in engineering curriculum offered by programs across the U.S. This is one of few studies that investigate the impact of doing so. Given the inherent characteristics of an EM and the engineering design process, this paper starts by describing the overlap between the two and reveals how they complement one another; then goes into a thematic analysis of the mindsets of twenty-seven students who had just completed a design activity accompanied by EM interventions in a first-year engineering course. The purpose of the study is to explore how their mindsets were revealed in their written reflections on: the attitudes and behaviors they perceive were necessary for successfully completing the design activity; the specified attitudes and behaviors they feel they possess; and which attitudes and behaviors they perceive are necessary for success after graduation. The results of this study reveal that students seamlessly weave together thoughts on actions performed during the design process with facets of an EM throughout their reflections. It includes evidence of how engineering design and EM can inform and influence one another while engineers engage in their work. The findings of this study help make the case for the need to co-facilitate the development of an EM as part of teaching engineering design in undergraduate engineering education. Motivation It takes time for new norms to be established in the engineering education community, but given enough time and a little reflection, changes become more apparent. Froyd, Wankat, and Smith (2012) wrote an article that summarizes five major shifts that have happened in engineering education over the past century-the third of which includes the “renewed emphasis on design” (p. 1346). Engaging in the engineering design project is one of the activities that unifies the work of all engineers, regardless of the specific discipline. Former National Academy of Engineering president, William Wulf, succinctly defined engineering as “design under constraint” (NAE, 2002). In fact, some would argue that design is the characteristic that distinguishes engineers from professionals in other science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields (Draper, 2009). The role and importance of design in engineering cannot be overstated. Given the importance of design in the work of an engineer, it is not surprising that it is an activity that is emphasized in various parts of the engineering education ecosystem. The rise of makerspaces, TechShops, and design studios of all kinds give place for engineers and others alike to tinker and engage in the engineering design process in a variety of informal learning contexts. More formally, design is a critical part of all engineering students’ last year of their undergraduate education (via capstone/senior design courses), and has increasingly becoming the norm in the first year engineering experience as well (Froyd et al., 2012; Lord & Chen, 2014). From a policy perspective, design is explicitly mentioned in two out of eleven of ABET’s student outcomes (i.e., B and C) (“Criteria For Accrediting Engineering Programs,” 2017). Thus, in informal, formal, and policy levels, there seems to be a shared understanding of the importance of engineering design. While design is here to stay, emerging trends permeate the engineering education ecosystem. One of the trends that has gained a lot of traction over the years is the increased emphasis on entrepreneurship and the entrepreneurial mindset. There are many indicators of its increasing prominence. The opportunity for engineering students to obtain entrepreneurshiprelated credentials (via minors, certificate programs, etc.) through their engineering programs is a relatively new phenomenon (e.g., at University of Michigan) (“Michigan Engineering Interdisciplinary Minors & Programs,” 2017). There has also been an increase in partnerships between engineering and business schools within a university (e.g., at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) (“Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Entrepreneurship,” 2010). Apart from these programmatic changes that reflect these trends, there is a growing body of scholarship within the engineering education literature that highlights the increase in the number of people working in the area and the expansions to the body of knowledge on this topic. For example, the development of publications venues like the Journal of Engineering Entrepreneurship (JEEN) and ASEE’s Division of Entrepreneurship and Innovation speak to rise of scholars and scholarship in this area. Moreover, foundations like the KERN Family Foundation (“The Kern Family Foundation,” 2016) is dedicated to supporting efforts that promote an entrepreneurial mindset among engineering students and faculty across the country as part of the Kern Entrepreneurship Engineering Network (“KEEN Engineering Unleashed,” 2017). This set of activities speaks to the growing prominence of entrepreneurship in the engineering ecosystem. Efforts to promote entrepreneurship in engineering education may come in a variety of forms. These activities can be conceptualized using a continuum with commercialization at one end and mindset at the other. The most common entrepreneurship-related activities that happen in the engineering education ecosystem are experiential in nature involving steps toward commercialization or creating a startup (Duval-Couetil, Shartrand, & Reed, 2016). These activities include the development of a business plan, consulting with practicing entrepreneurs, interviewing potential customers, delivering pitches, applying to grants, and prototyping a physical product or application. What are not as common, however, are activities that focus on cultivating an entrepreneurial mindset (EM). A mindset can be defined as framework for making predications and judging the meanings of events in one’s world (Yeager & Dweck, 2012). This trend is changing, however, due to the increasing set of EM focused activities sponsored by the KERN Family Foundation. While the activities at this end of the spectrum are increasing, the number of in-depth qualitative and/or quantitative analysis on the impact of cultivating an EM is lacking. This study helps address this need. In short, this study describes the overlap between the EM and the engineering design process to reveal how they complement one another by analyzing the written reflections of engineering students who had just completed a design activity. The goal of the study is to explore how their mindsets were revealed in their written reflections on: the attitudes and behaviors they perceive were necessary for successfully completing the design activity; the specified attitudes and behaviors they feel they possess; and which attitudes and behaviors they perceive are necessary for success after graduation. The next sections provide a review of the interventions that have been used to cultivate an EM and ways in which it has been assessed, and a conceptual lens guiding this work. After discussing the methods of data collection and analysis, the themes that emerged will be discussed. Implications of this work and next steps will also be discussed. Literature Review In recent years, there have been several engineering faculty at KEEN partner institutions working on efforts to encourage students to develop an EM. Changes have been made to a variety of different aspects of courses to encourage the development of EM including the content, assessment methods, and pedagogical techniques. These efforts are typically focused on behavioral and mindset outcomes defined by KERN’s ‘3Cs’. Specifically, most efforts are focused on helping students to develop curiosity to explore the world, and make connections between different sources and types of information in order to create value for others (“KEEN Engineering Unleashed,” 2017). Pedagogical techniques developed and implemented in the classroom aimed at developing EM have sometimes been referred to as entrepreneurially-minded learning (EML) (A. Gerhart & Melton, 2016). This review provides an overview of the different approaches that have been used by faculty to encourage students’ development of EM, and the attempts that have been made to assess the results of their efforts. Interventions to Promote the Development of EM Efforts to encourage students’ development of EM have been implemented in a variety of different courses and extracurricular events at universities across the United States. The most common courses in which EM has been integrated are those which focus on engineering design, or project-based courses at all levels (freshman through senior) (Bell-Huff, Carpenter, & Gerhart, 2016; Cook & Cuper, 2010; Fry, Jordan, Leman, Garner, & Thomas, 2010; A L Gerhart & Carpenter, 2013; Andrew L. Gerhart, Carpenter, Fletcher, & Meyer, 2014; Kim et al., 2016; Rayess, 2016; Riofrio et al., 2015; Singh, Klingler, Dougherty, & Moncada, 2015). At several institutions, EM has been integrated into first year engineering courses through hands-on projects and activities (Condoor & Mcquilling, 2009; Fry & Van Treuren, 2016; Andrew L. Gerhart et al., 2014; Rayess, 2