FINDINGS
THEMES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY
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Findings
Findings
Our team tied together common themes found from our interviews and looked into existing literature to find other important things to address. For any commonalities in our interviews and literature readings, we looked into specifically. We then categorized these commonalities into five themes as a way to understand the barriers and bridges of transformative research.
The barriers to transformative research are an accumulation of various matters, ranging from student well-being to communication barriers in interdisciplinary teams. Transformative research cannot be readily solved by tackling one problem—it is a large class of problems that requires the support and commitment of both students and faculty members address, and it definitely takes more than just one scientific background to solve.
Our team compiled our findings into six main themes to easily understand the barriers and bridges of transformative research:
- Inconsistent Perceptions of Creativity: There is not a definite definition for creativity. One might equate it to a 'childish imagination', others as 'making something new', and while another person would define it as 'applying what you know'. Because of the inconsistent perceptions of creativity, students and faculty members mistrust the role of creativity in research. Especially in an academic setting, creativity is seen as an accessory or a waste of time.
- Poor Communication and Limited Funding Are Barriers to Interdisciplinary Work: Interdisciplinary work is a powerful research tool; however, the lack of trans-discipline communication skills and funding for interdisciplinary work are extremely limiting.
- Student Well-Being and Student Experience Lack Adequate Attention: Graduate Students' well-being and experiences are often overlooked, resulting in many graduate students attend graduate programs for a MS or a Ph.D.
- Industry vs Academia Trade-Off Paradigm: Young engineers are often faced with the perceived decision of whether they wish to follow a career path into academia or industry. This intellectual crossroads may dispel individuals who may have otherwise performed strong, transformative research from continuing their education in graduate school.
- Graduate School Applications Leave Students Feeling Pigeonholed: The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (2018) states that the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) alone is not a strong indicator towards success in graduate schools. Yet, emphasis on GRE scores on graduate school applications leave many applicants feeling pigeonholed by their options. Additionally, recent undergraduates leave their undergraduate programs with their own perceptions of what gradate school opportunities and challenges will look like.
- Global University Rankings Encourage Global Mobilization of Students and Promote Transnational Education: Many US schools are among the top tier schools listed by global university rankings, making the US a global leader in graduate school research, which ultimately draws students from around the world to study in the US for graduate school education.
- "Abstract Science" vs "Applied Science": Learning science 'for the sake of learning' is often overshadowed by a deeply engrained culture of emphasizing the application of science. After years of engineering education, engineering students just want to apply what they know in the workplace.
Inconsistent Perceptions of Creativity
In the 21st century we live in today, information is more accessible than ever, technology is extremely intelligent, and there is no shortage of technically competent researchers. However, to address the large scale, “important” problems that face our societies today, such challenges rarely adhere to traditional boundaries. Transformative engineering research requires more than intellectual curiosity and technical depth, but also creativity.
However, there is not a definite definition for creativity. One might equate it to a 'childish imagination', others as 'making something new', and while another person would define it as 'applying what you know'. Because of the inconsistent perceptions of creativity, students and faculty members mistrust the role of creativity in research.
We found no shortage of literature pieces that detail frameworks for understanding, implementing, fostering creativity in engineering education, and its importance as a competency for tackling important problems is coming to the foreground. But overwhelmingly, students we interviewed continuously expressed that this capacity or fulfillment are either delayed in their education or found exclusively outside of engineering. We categorize this as barriers to creativity in an academic setting:
“A lot of the classes, even the ones in my major, weren't things that were interesting to me, they were kind of focusing on certain aspects of electrical engineering which never really appealed to me [...] Finally, senior year, I got to be a little more creative. The projects specifically are more creative” (rg2-AA)
“But there’s a lot less room for creativity in typical engineering I think. So best to have your hobbies on the other side.” (ug5-AVCO)
An absence of creative fulfillment, or failure to tap into that capacity of students, can make pursuing research or work feel unmotivated and deter students from exercising that capacity to take research into groundbreaking directions. Grad schools have the opportunity to create an environment that invites students to exercise their existing creative capacity, or cultivate a new one, in an engineering context. By tapping into this creative intellect and encouraging creative fulfillment, students may be able to partake in more transformative research at their university. Lessons can be learned from how undergraduate institutions and industry positions do or do not ignite this capacity. We would like to further research the impact that increased creativity can have on transformative research capabilities in graduate studies.
We also found that students may have their own inhibiting factors to creativity. Students may not have confidence in their creative abilities or they may see their technical competency as a replacement for creativity. In the latter concept, students may feel creativity blocks productivity, or that creativity is purely for aesthetic purposes, rather than see it as a principle for problem-solving.2
User rg4-aa approaches creativity as a burden:
"When I feel creative, I feel like I'm not, it's not like as much work as if it was just like, you know, like I'm sitting in the in a desk and just kind of thinking like, “what is it that it needs to do? What is it?”
Often trained to find one right answer and avoid risks, students may feel creativity exists in a separate realm than in an academic setting. However, teachers who emphasize the importance of risk-taking, mistake-making, and creative pursuits boost the capacity creativity and for transformative research in graduate students.
Poor Communication and Limited Funding Are Barriers to Interdisciplinary Work
Interdisciplinary work is imperative to transformative research, however it is not commonly encouraged/cultivated. Through our research, we have seen common tropes such as the lack of access and opportunities for interdisciplinary collaboration, the lack of value/interest in interdisciplinary skills, and the lack of communication skills in interdisciplinary teams.
Interviewee, I6-AA, shares his experience with working in interdisciplinary teams.
“So some people feel very offended if you approach their discipline and you are not part of it, like they like “what they hell are you talking about? I’m the electrical guy, not you, you’re the mechanical guy” for example, so they don’t want to see you approaching their discipline and others are like “oh wow you understand it, and you have a good idea ” so they are welcoming it , very dependent on the character of the person” (I6-AA)
[When asked how interdisciplinary work impacts engineering]
"It a, so, you know there's a little bit of budding heads, like you know, which discipline is better than the other but overall like, we all want the same goal and that's just to create solution, to, to build something, to make something work, to make something beautiful. So it is, it's mostly like communicating. Communicating within like these interdisciplines, and just, thinking or like talking about a solution. So that's the main thing is just communication." (I6-AA)
Students may feel competitive/challenged when working with other disciplines, making their collaboration counterproductive. The inability to communicate discourages such collaboration, causing all disciplines to miss certain opportunities. Thus, it is necessary for grad programs to foster communication between disciplines.
Student Well-Being and Student Experience Lack Adequate Attention
Asking and answering this question is an integral part to increasing transformative research at engineering graduate schools and STEM grad schools at large. Undergraduate student experiences with burnout and work demands are just a few factors that impact mental health. Issues pertaining to the diversity of a student body also have great impacts on how prepared students feel for grad school and what communities they vie for after graduating. Students have also repeatedly expressed that they can’t relax even when they’re away from the campus. We can read the following quotes:
“And I know that if I would go into grad school like this, I’d probably be, I would not be able to perform as I, as I probably can or else I would want to” (rg1-AA)
“So...for like that week, when like the black face came out, nothing really happened in our department. It was almost as if we were trying to ignore it. Maybe not ignore it, but we just didn't have time to think about it.” (rg1-AA)
“So when I got to a vacation, I couldn’t relax for a solid two weeks. I just couldn’t, I had to stay active. All my friends were like why can’t you relax, i don’t know! I want to! I can’t, cause i don’t know how.” (ug5-AVCO)
Experiences such as these can cause students to self-select out of grad school for a number of reasons: students feel unprepared for the perceived demands of university, they vie for the established and welcoming community of previously held internships instead, and are exhausted from having their academic commitments intersect so much with their personal lives.
Another important issue to address is student confidence. This is related to how valued they feel and what contributions they feel they are making with their work. It is therefore necessary for grad programs to create environments that address experiences like these, and signal to the wider public that they are addressing them and how effectively.
Industry vs Academia Trade-off Paradigm
Young engineers are often faced with the perceived decision of whether they wish to follow a career path into academia or industry. This intellectual crossroads may dispel individuals who may have otherwise performed strong, transformative research from continuing their education in graduate school. Additionally, the current disconnect between academic and industrial research cuts-off potential avenues for innovation in scientific fields. Furthermore, financial burdens of attending graduate school push students away from academia and further encourage industry work. Bridging the gap between industry and academia within engineering programs to lessen the feeling of needing to choose in the first place dissipates this disconnect and promotes collaboration between the two entities.
User, rg5-AA, is an example of a case where a student with potential to perform transformative research move away from graduate studies due to their current satisfaction in industry:
“I feel content with learning on the job right now” (rg5-AA)
“I want to learn more, I just want to be a better person in that field” (rg5-AA)
“We want to go to graduate school but we’d rather have the company we’re working for pay that for us” (ug1-CO)
However, this begs the question, should graduate school be a place for research, industry preparation, or should it be for both? Some professors have suggested that academia should promote participation of industry representatives in their teaching staff and advisory boards”1
Graduate School Applications Often Leave Students Feeling Pigeonholed
Analyzing the reasons that motivate/deter people from grad school is essential in understanding how to increase transformative research in these programs. Recognizing the barriers of the graduate school application is fundamental and at the forefront of even recruiting people to conduct and contribute to transformative research.
We have broken this down into include the application process itself and student perceptions of graduate school opportunities and burdens they feel grad school will bring. Understanding what qualities an ideal applicant would surmise would ameliorate the confusion and frustration students may feel when trying to gain entry towards graduate school.
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (2018) states that the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) alone is not a strong indicator towards success in graduate schools. Yet, emphasis on GRE scores on graduate school applications leave many applicants feeling pigeonholed by their options:
"I took the GRE when I was senior, score was so bad I didn’t think I would get into any school. So yeah that’s it." (13-AA)
Additionally, recent undergraduates leave their undergraduate programs with their own perceptions of what gradate school opportunities and challenges will look like:
"I’m a guy that... I’m a person that really needs like rest and sleep. And I feel like this last year I was just so burnt out physically. And I know that if I would go into grad school like this, I’d probably be, I would not be able to perform as I, as I probably can or else I would want to." (rg1-AA)
"At least in my program, every single Professor every year gloats about how low their test grades are. So right at the beginning, the very first week, you're already given this idea that this class is impossible." (rg5-AA)
Although some students have set their goals on a graduate education, because their undergraduate experience was tiring or they are experiencing burnout, they may steer away from graduate studies. Overlapping with our theme of well-being, the burden potential graduate students feel they may face in their mental and physical health may deter them from graduate school. It is necessary programs acknowledge this barrier in order to recruit potential candidates.
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