Illuminating the Pathways of Latine and Hispanic PhDs into Engineering Teaching-Focused Faculty Positions

Joseph Leon Henry; Natascha Trellinger Buswell; Eva Fuentes-Lopez

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Conference: 2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Portland, Oregon
Publication Date: June 23, 2024
Start Date: June 23, 2024
End Date: July 12, 2024
Conference Session: Advancing Equity in STEM Academia: Insights and Strategies
Tagged Division: Minorities in Engineering Division(MIND)
Tagged Topic: Diversity
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/47551

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Paper Authors

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Joseph Leon Henry University of California, Irvine

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Sociology PhD candidate at the University of California Irvine studying inclusion and equity interventions in STEM higher education classrooms.

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Natascha Trellinger Buswell University of California, Irvine orcid.org/0000-0001-8503-5787

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Natascha Trellinger Buswell is an associate professor of teaching in the department of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the University of California, Irvine. She earned her B.S. in aerospace engineering at Syracuse University and her Ph.D. in engineering education at Purdue University. She is particularly interested in equitable and inclusive teaching methods and graduate level engineering education.

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Eva Fuentes-Lopez University of California, San Diego

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Abstract

Latine and Hispanic engineering students rarely see a faculty member whose background mirrors their own. The AGEP (Alliances for Graduate Education and The Professoriate) Hiring Interventions for Representation and Equity (HIRE) project focuses on increasing Latine and Hispanic representation in the professoriate through interventions aimed at making the hiring process more equitable. As part of this larger research project, our team aims to understand and elucidate the experiences on the pathway to the professoriate of the currently underrepresented Latine/Hispanic population in STEM teaching-focused positions. To do this, we employ in-depth qualitative interviews of current teaching-focused faculty who have successfully navigated the pathway through PhD programs into the teaching professoriate. We use a subset of six interviews with Latine/Hispanic engineering teaching faculty (out of a more significant subset of 15 interviews with the broader STEM teaching professoriate). We seek to understand and elucidate the unique pathways and challenges for this population in both their pathways to their positions as well as their experiences in their current faculty positions. To analyze the pathways to the professoriate, we employ a community cultural wealth framework (Yosso, 2014) that accounts for six forms of cultural capital that communities of color employ to navigate institutions that traditionally value only hegemonically valued forms of cultural capital. In tandem with community cultural wealth, we utilize transition theory to understand their experiences moving out of the graduate student role and into faculty positions. In particular, the transition into faculty positions has been studied for non-minoritized populations and into research-focused positions. We aim to add to the literature about Latine/Hispanic faculty pathways in teaching-focused positions. We present findings from a thematic analysis of our results on the role of intersectionality (across axes such as immigration status, language, country of origin, colorism, race, gender and class) and its impact on the path to the professoriate, the use of community cultural wealth to navigate multiple institutions of higher education, and the importance of culturally relevant mentorship both on the pathway to and in faculty positions. Yosso, T. J. (2014). Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth. In Critical race theory in education (pp. 181-204). Routledge.

Citation
Format

Henry, J. L., & Buswell, N. T., & Fuentes-Lopez, E. (2024, June), Illuminating the Pathways of Latine and Hispanic PhDs into Engineering Teaching-Focused Faculty Positions Paper presented at 2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Portland, Oregon. https://peer.asee.org/47551

TY - CPAPER
AB - Latine and Hispanic engineering students rarely see a faculty member whose background mirrors their own. The AGEP (Alliances for Graduate Education and The Professoriate) Hiring Interventions for Representation and Equity (HIRE) project focuses on increasing Latine and Hispanic representation in the professoriate through interventions aimed at making the hiring process more equitable. As part of this larger research project, our team aims to understand and elucidate the experiences on the pathway to the professoriate of the currently underrepresented Latine/Hispanic population in STEM teaching-focused positions. To do this, we employ in-depth qualitative interviews of current teaching-focused faculty who have successfully navigated the pathway through PhD programs into the teaching professoriate. We use a subset of six interviews with Latine/Hispanic engineering teaching faculty (out of a more significant subset of 15 interviews with the broader STEM teaching professoriate). We seek to understand and elucidate the unique pathways and challenges for this population in both their pathways to their positions as well as their experiences in their current faculty positions. To analyze the pathways to the professoriate, we employ a community cultural wealth framework (Yosso, 2014) that accounts for six forms of cultural capital that communities of color employ to navigate institutions that traditionally value only hegemonically valued forms of cultural capital. In tandem with community cultural wealth, we utilize transition theory to understand their experiences moving out of the graduate student role and into faculty positions. In particular, the transition into faculty positions has been studied for non-minoritized populations and into research-focused positions. We aim to add to the literature about Latine/Hispanic faculty pathways in teaching-focused positions. We present findings from a thematic analysis of our results on the role of intersectionality (across axes such as immigration status, language, country of origin, colorism, race, gender and class) and its impact on the path to the professoriate, the use of community cultural wealth to navigate multiple institutions of higher education, and the importance of culturally relevant mentorship both on the pathway to and in faculty positions.
Yosso, T. J. (2014). Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth. In Critical race theory in education (pp. 181-204). Routledge.

AU - Joseph Leon Henry
AU - Natascha Trellinger Buswell
AU - Eva Fuentes-Lopez
CY - Portland, Oregon
DA - 2024/06/23
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Illuminating the Pathways of Latine and Hispanic PhDs into Engineering Teaching-Focused Faculty Positions
UR - https://peer.asee.org/47551
ER -