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students are in the program (rather than looking toward graduation and employment or
graduate school) is to narrow the gender gap in self-confidence, which reflects the
inclusive nature of the program.
To better explore the effect of Rowan on the students’ self-confidence, we looked at
how engineering self-confidence changes from the fall to the spring semester of our
study.
CHANGE IN ENGINEERING SELF-CONFIDENCE OVER THE COURSE
OF THE ACADEMIC YEAR
To represent change in confidence that they belong in the major, we looked at the
change in agreement with the statement, “I am confident that engineering is the right
major for me.” To represent change in confidence about engineering abilities, we looked
at the change in agreement with the statement, “I am mechanically inclined.” If the
response in the Spring was more confident than in the Fall, students were considered to
have increased their self-confidence; if the response in the Spring was less confident than
in the Fall, students were considered to have decreased their self-confidence; if the
response was the same for the two points in time, students were considered stable in their
self-confidence.
Over the course of the academic year, the majority (about 60%) of the students did
not change their self-confidence that engineering was the right major for them or that
they were mechanically inclined. However, nearly 20% did increase their self-confidence
on each of these indicators; and over 20% lowered their self-confidence in these respects.
IID-138