Background: Although most engineering graduate students are funded and usually complete their degrees faster than other disciplines, attrition remains a problem in engineering. Existing research has explored the psychological and sociological factors contributing to attrition but not the structural factors impacting attrition. Purpose/Hypothesis:…

Background: While researchers in graduate engineering education are beginning to study facets of student experiences as they relate to attrition and persistence, theoretical applications of thriving theory have not been applied to graduate education contexts. Literature addresses students who persist and those who depart, inherently making…

Background: Postdoctoral training holds an increasingly important place in preparation for leading academic and research positions. While little empirical research has described postdoctoral training beyond the sciences, across all fields, "misaligned expectations" are often touted as a key source of postdoctoral strife.…

Background: Degree completion rates for doctoral engineering students remain stagnant at levels lower than necessary to meet national and global workforce needs. Increasing degree completion can improve opportunities for individuals and provide the human resources needed to address engineering challenges. Purpose/Hypothesis: In this work, we…

Background: While studies examining graduate engineering student attrition have grown more prevalent, there is an incomplete understanding of the plight faced by persisting students. As mental health and well-being crises emerge in graduate student populations, it is important to understand how students conceptualize their well-being in relation…

Background: Despite many initiatives to improve graduate student and faculty diversity in engineering, there has been little or no change in the percentage of people from racially minoritized backgrounds in either of these groups. Purpose/Hypothesis: The purpose of this paper is to counter the scarcity fallacy, in which institutions blame the…

Background: Given high attrition rates and lack of interest in faculty careers, it is crucial to understand how doctoral engineering students conceptualize academia and academic careers. Purpose/Hypothesis: This study aims to characterize the development of academic disenchantment among engineering students who have considered departure from their…

Background: While attrition from the PhD has been attributed to many high-level causal factors, such as funding, advisor relationship, and "fit" into a department, few studies have closely examined the mechanisms of attrition or why and how graduate engineering students begin to consider attrition from their doctoral programs.…

Background: In addition to the benefits of a diverse faculty, many institutions are under pressure from students and administrators to increase the number of faculty from historically excluded backgrounds. Despite increases in the numbers of engineering PhD earners from these groups, the percentages of Black/African American and Hispanic/Latino…

Background: The retention of traditionally underserved students remains a pressing problem across graduate engineering programs. Disciplinary differences in graduate engineering identity provide a lens to investigate students' experiences and can pinpoint potential opportunity structures that support or hinder progress based on social and personal…

Background: Graduate education literature tends to focus on faculty careers with little attention to industry careers. However, more than one-third of U.S. engineering doctorates enter industry. Purpose: Our purpose is to understand engineering graduate students' interest in industry, academia, and government careers as it relates to their…

Background: Research shows that engineering and computing students who are marginalized by race and/or gender and experience social suffering often wish to challenge social inequities through their vocation, an attribute we refer to as an equity ethic. This study explores how doctoral engineering and computing students develop this attribute even…

Background: Ethical issues have become increasingly important in discussions of sustainability, an area involving ethical and sociotechnical decisions that engineers may not be prepared to consider. Recent literature on engineering ethics highlights the need to integrate social and environmental aspects of ethics into technical topics through…

Background: Effective interpersonal communication skills in the advisor-advisee relationship context are important to the success of graduate students. Few instruments have previously been developed to assess students' communication skills in this context. Purpose/Hypothesis: This study reports the development and validation of the Science,…