"An Honest Conversation: Diversity and Inclusion in Engineering"

Kelly J. Cross, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Engineering Education
Chemical and Materials Engineering Department
University of Nevada, Reno
 

ABSTRACT
Over the past few years, we witnessed several examples of social injustice and social unrest. As human beings and engineers, we must decide how we want to respond to what happened and how we want to move forward. Calls to improve our approach to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) have coincided with the call to update our overall engineering curriculum. Over the years, several initiatives have been launched to address such issues, which primarily attempt to address perceived inadequacies in underrepresented students. However, scarce efforts have been developed to address the engineering culture that has limited the full participation of women and people of color in engineering. Furthermore, few of us in engineering have the knowledge, skills, or ability to productively engage with issues leading to the marginalization and social unrest. Rarely do we dare to apply our problem-solving or critical thinking approaches to improving DEI. As a result, the goal of the first part of the talk is to provide engineers with language to have an honest conversation about our individual and collective response to the inequity in engineering and realign our actions to improve engineering education. This impactful workshop will provide definitions and practical examples of key DEI concepts in engineering based on holistic interdisciplinary research.

The second part of the talk will focus on Dr. Cross CAREER grant. The field of engineering has realized marginal success in achieving diversity goals regardless of investments of money, research, and time. The Gaming Intervention for Values Engineers Need (GIVEN) project will create a new efficient approach to training engineering faculty about diversity in STEM. An important outcome for the GIVEN project is to increase faculty engagement and expand diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts beyond faculty from underserved and marginalized groups. Engineering faculty, despite being aware of diversity issues, generally lack knowledge and have limited resources to intervene or make change to engage with DEI efforts. The GIVEN project is a foundation to provide engineering faculty with the needed resources to meaningfully engage with DEI concepts and could revolutionize DEI training and engineering faculty professional development. This project will measure engineering faculty beliefs about DEI and the research team will assess the impact of the gaming tool with both surveys and individual interviews. This project will encourage engineering faculty to engage with campus diversity efforts through reflection of their role and provide information resources to develop personalized strategies to contribute to local DEI efforts. The project aligns with NSF Broadening participation funding program by developing an innovative method and project to significantly impact the recruitment and retention of engineering faculty by transforming the engineering culture to prioritize diversity, equity, and inclusion.
 

BIOGRAPHY
Dr. Kelly J. Cross is a data-informed, transformational mission-focused culturally responsive practitioner, researcher, and educational leader. She earned her Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering from Purdue University in 2007 and Master of Science in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of Cincinnati in 2011. Cross completed her doctoral program in the Engineering Education department at Virginia Tech in 2015 and worked as a post-doctoral researcher with the Illinois Foundry for Innovation in Engineering Education at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). Dr. Cross worked in the Department of Bioengineering working to redesign the curriculum through the NSF funded Revolutionizing Engineering Departments (RED) grant. She is a member of the ASEE Leadership Virtual Community of Practice (LVCP) that organizes and facilitates Safe Zone Training workshops. Dr. Cross has conducted workshops on managing personal bias in STEM, online and in-person, in addition to faculty training on power and privilege. Her research interests include diversity and inclusion in STEM, intersectionality, teamwork and communication skills, assessment, and identity construction. Her teaching philosophy focuses on student centered approaches such as problem-based learning and culturally relevant pedagogy. Dr. Cross’ complimentary professional activities promote inclusive excellence through collaboration. She is an NSF CAREER awardee, delivered multiple distinguished lectures, and has received a national mentoring award.