An Investigation into How One Engineering School is Approaching Gender Diversity

Nationally, the percentage of women earning degrees in engineering remains low despite continued efforts to attract and retain women. In 2016, however, more than 50% of the undergraduate degrees in engineering awarded at the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth (Thayer) went to women, and well over 40% of the current engineering students are women, a level more than twice the national average. What is our campus doing differently to successfully attract and retain women in engineering? Several things set the engineering school at Dartmouth apart from other campuses. Key differences include the fact that the engineering school is part of a liberal arts campus, is fairly small, and has no separate departments within engineering. As with many liberal arts universities, students are admitted to the campus but do not declare a major until they are sophomores, giving them time to explore different courses and departments before declaring a major. Dartmouth is a private institution. Students are admitted to Dartmouth by the Admissions Office; the engineering school does not participate in the admissions process nor do they influence selections. In order to better understand why our campus has been successful at attracting and retaining women in engineering, we examined our program and enrollment trends, conducted interviews, and surveyed faculty, students and alumni. Based on this data, key aspects of the curriculum that seem to effectively attract and retain women include the flexibility of the curriculum, a focus on design and innovation, a collaborative and friendly atmosphere, the presence of female peer mentors, an emphasis on the liberal arts, and a focus on real-world projects. Data from surveys, interviews and courses are shared so that faculty and administrators at other campuses may learn about different strategies that could be adapted at their own campuses to increase gender diversity. Background Despite continued efforts to attract and retain women, the percentage of women earning degrees in engineering remains low nationally. Women earned close to 60% of all bachelor’s degrees in 2012 but less than 20% of those degrees were in engineering [1]. At Dartmouth, however, the percentage of women in engineering is approaching gender parity [2]. As shown in Figure 1, the percentage of female students graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in engineering at Dartmouth peaked at 54% in 2016. While the percentage of women graduating in engineering in 2017 went down, it remained high at 45%, which is more than twice the national average; the national average of women earning bachelor degrees in engineering is less than 20% [1]. Enrollment trends in current classes indicate that between 45 and 55% of the graduates will be women in upcoming years as well. What is our campus, and other campuses who are approaching gender parity, doing differently and how can these approaches be adapted at other engineering schools? Figure 1. Students Graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Engineering by Gender and Year Engineering at Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth Several things set the engineering school at Dartmouth apart from other campuses. Key differences include the fact that the engineering school is part of a liberal arts university, is fairly small, and has no separate departments within engineering. As with many liberal arts universities, students are admitted to the campus but do not declare a major until they are sophomores, giving them time to explore different courses and departments before declaring a major. Approximately 100 students graduate each year with a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in engineering. Due to the high percentage of liberal arts courses that students must take, the BA is not accredited in engineering. In order to gain more depth in engineering, students may opt to take an additional 9 courses to earn a Bachelor of Engineering (BE), which is an ABETaccredited degree. In 2017, 45% of those graduating with a BE were women. Approximately 75% of the BA students in engineering also complete the BE degree each year, with many completing both the AB and BE is less than 5 years. The average time to complete the BE at Dartmouth is 4.7 years with ~30% of students completing both the AB and BE in 4 years and over 90% completing both degrees in 5 years. Nationally only 53% of students who enrolled in 2009 in four-year, private institutions completed a degree in 4 years and 66% completed a degree in 6 years [3]. Most European institutions require 5 years of study for an engineering degree. While the number of faculty in engineering at Dartmouth has grown over the years, the number of full-time teaching faculty remains fairly small. The faculty in the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth includes 38 tenure-track faculty members, 5 instructional faculty members, and 11 research faculty members. Faculty members on the instructional track are expected to teach more than tenure-track faculty members but are not expected to conduct research and are not eligible for tenure. Faculty members on the research track are expected to develop a strong research program, develop their own funding sources, and are not eligible for tenure; research faculty typically have no teaching responsibilities. Like many engineering schools, the percentage of female faculty members is quite low. Overall 19% of the faculty are female, with a higher percentage of females among instructional and research faculty (non0 20 40 60 80 10