Asee peer logo

Institutional Racism in Scholarship Renewal (Research)

Download Paper |

Conference

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Location

Virtual Conference

Publication Date

July 26, 2021

Start Date

July 26, 2021

End Date

July 19, 2022

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--37348

Permanent URL

https://strategy.asee.org/37348

Download Count

307

Request a correction

Paper Authors

biography

Alan S. Hoback University of Detroit Mercy

visit author page

Alan S. Hoback is Professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering at the University of Detroit Mercy. He is a registered Professional Engineer in the State of Michigan. Dr. Hoback received his Bachelor’s degree in Physics from Hastings College, Nebraska in 1987. He earned his B.S., M.S and Sc.D. from Washington University in 1989, 1991, and 1993, respectively.

visit author page

Download Paper |

Abstract

Institutions that have open admissions are more likely to enroll students who can’t complete a degree in the specified time. It is common practice in higher education to award scholarships for the expected time of a degree. Students are told that scholarships may or may not be extended if additional time is needed for study. A case is made that the effect of this policy on underrepresented minorities (URM) is institutional racism. URM students are admitted to engineering program on a conditional basis much more commonly than other students. Since engineering curricula are full and have no room for additional courses, that means that it will take more than the normal time to graduate. The stress of not knowing whether scholarships will be extended pressures students to drop out or select non-engineering majors. This same pressure affects other students but has a disproportionate effect on URM students. Other groups representing diverse students are also more prone to stress and so could be similarly affected. Graduation data supports this as a factor. Scholarship renewal policies are compared for public and private four-year colleges, Historical Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs).

Hoback, A. S. (2021, July), Institutional Racism in Scholarship Renewal (Research) Paper presented at 2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual Conference. 10.18260/1-2--37348

ASEE holds the copyright on this document. It may be read by the public free of charge. Authors may archive their work on personal websites or in institutional repositories with the following citation: © 2021 American Society for Engineering Education. Other scholars may excerpt or quote from these materials with the same citation. When excerpting or quoting from Conference Proceedings, authors should, in addition to noting the ASEE copyright, list all the original authors and their institutions and name the host city of the conference. - Last updated April 1, 2015