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Stop the leaking pipeline! : Investigating the presence of professional socialisation in engineering education

Jooss, Kim (2021) Stop the leaking pipeline! : Investigating the presence of professional socialisation in engineering education.

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Abstract:Nowadays, there is an increasingly growing lack of engineers. One of the possible explanations for this is that around 40% of the graduated engineers leave the engineering sector. A factor contributing to this is an underdeveloped professional identity (PI) as an engineer. One way the PI is shaped, is by engaging in professional socialising experiences. The current study aimed to investigate how professional socialisation is present in engineering curricula. To do so, the formal and perceived curricula of four degree programmes are investigated. The formal curriculum is investigated by document analysis and the perceived curriculum is investigated by using both semi-structured interviews and a survey. The results revealed that professional socialisation in the formal curriculum of the programs under study is primarily focused on the lower levels of engagement, namely at exposing students to the profession and to some extent on gaining knowledge about the profession. After the first two years of the degree programme, there are some experiences focused on interacting with the profession, but there are little experiences focusing on reflection. The analysis of the perceived curriculum indicated that there are other professional socialising experiences embedded than covered in the formal curriculum, indicating that there is a misalignment between the formal and perceived curriculum. Besides insight in the formal and perceived curriculum, a rubric was developed which aims to map the presence of professional socialisation in the formal curriculum. The rubric seems a good first step to investigate the presence of professional socialisation in the curriculum, but further research is needed to validate the rubric. This study adds value to the existing literature, since this study is the first which developed an instrument to map the presence of professional socialisation in engineering curricula.
Item Type:Essay (Master)
Faculty:BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences
Subject:81 education, teaching
Programme:Educational Science and Technology MSc (60023)
Link to this item:https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/85637
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