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Impact of Engineering Ambassador Program on Academic Attainment of Minority Students in Engineering

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Conference

2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Location

Columbus, Ohio

Publication Date

June 24, 2017

Start Date

June 24, 2017

End Date

June 28, 2017

Conference Session

Minorities in Engineering Division Technical Session 2

Tagged Division

Minorities in Engineering

Tagged Topic

Diversity

Page Count

10

DOI

10.18260/1-2--28464

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/28464

Download Count

537

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Paper Authors

biography

Mohsen Mosleh Howard University

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Dr. M. Mosleh is a Professor of mechanical engineering at Howard University, a Fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), and an author and inventor. His research area is surface and interface science and engineering with a focus on energy and manufacturing applications. Dr. Mosleh received his Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He has extensively published in journals and conferences and produced patents. He is also the founder and director of the Surface Engineering and Nanofluids Laboratory (SENL) with the state-of-the-art nanofluid characterization and testing capabilities in the College of Engineering and Architecture. He has held administrator roles such as the Graduate Program Director in Mechanical Engineering and the Interim Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Education at Howard University.

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biography

Claudia Marin-Artieda Howard University

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Dr. Marin joined Howard University in 2008. She received her Master’s degree (2002) and her Ph.D. (2007) from the State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo. Dr. Marin’s current research focuses on theoretical and experimental studies on the dynamic interaction among structures, nonstructural components and systems, contents, and their protective measures under earthquake shaking. Dr. Marin has received several awards and scholarships, among others, the NSF- CAREER award for “Passive Seismic Protective Systems for Nonstructural Systems and Components in Multistory Building”(2012-2017), and was a recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship. Before coming to the United States to pursue her Master’s degree, Dr. Marin already had seven years of professional experience working for HMV Ingenieros.

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Abstract

In this paper, the impact of the Engineering Ambassador Program (EAP), which engages undergraduate engineering students as Ambassadors in K-12 outreach activities, on the stimulation of interest in STEM, self-efficacy, and actual academic attainment of Ambassadors is presented. The collected data over several years reveals that over 2/3 of activity leaders and project coordinators of the EAP at Howard University (HU) expressed higher confidence in their ability in understanding and succeeding in engineering because of their EAP experience. Also, the activity leaders and project coordinators achieved higher major and overall grade point averages (GPAs). Furthermore, improved academic performance in the courses related to the projects that Ambassadors were exposed to such as hands-on earthquake and coastal engineering projects was attained. Lastly, the Ambassadors exhibited a shorter time to degree completion with their peers who did not participate in the EAP.

Mosleh, M., & Marin-Artieda, C. (2017, June), Impact of Engineering Ambassador Program on Academic Attainment of Minority Students in Engineering Paper presented at 2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Columbus, Ohio. 10.18260/1-2--28464

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