IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2017 - 46

environmental engineering traditionally have higher female enrollment (close to 40%). Co-curricular
and extracurricular activities (such
as those facilitated by professional
organizations like Engineers Without Borders) that enable students to
directly assist communities in need
have achieved at least equal if not
majority participation by female students. The same can be said for curricular programs like University of
California - Berkeley's new Development Engineering doctoral minor
[9]. Are impact-focused programs
the key to solving the gender imbalance in engineering? One way to
find out is to study the motivations
of why women and men participate
in a technology-based social entrepreneurship program.
For this study, we investigated the
Humanitarian Engineering and Social
Entrepreneurship (HESE) program at
Penn State, an integrated learning,
research, and entrepreneurship program that brings together students
and faculty across campus in the
rigorous research, design, field-testing, and launch of technology-based
enterprises in low- and middleincome countries. Through a series of
five courses, completed by students
over multiple years, HESE teams systematically advance enterprises that
address grand challenges related to
healthcare, food security, and energy
poverty. The students' enterprises
are social ventures, which means
that they prioritize social impact
while being financially self-sustaining (independent of charity or donations), and they ultimately have the
goal of large-scale commercialization
and dissemination. The HESE portfolio includes ventures built around
technology products such as affordable greenhouses and low-cost medical devices, a telemedicine system,
and certification systems for solar
panels. Students in the program
also work on original publishable

research that strengthens ventures
with evidence-based and data-driven
approaches. The overarching goal of
HESE is to deliver sustainable impact
while preparing students for careers
in social innovation and global sustainable development. HESE courses
are open to every student on campus, regardless of major or degree
program. Each year, about 60-80 students are engaged in the core classes. Over the last decade more than
half the students have consistently
been women.
Why do students enroll in the
HESE program and how can we
extrapolate lessons learned to influence other engineering programs?
The students' homework for the first
day of each Spring semester is to
write a blog post responding to the
prompt, "Why did you enroll in this
class?" We studied the responses of
students, male and female, over the
course of five years, to understand
these articulated motivations. All students' blogs were analyzed and recurrent themes were identified. The
authors then coded the blogs to determine occurrence of each theme.
We found that men as well as
women differentiated (and aspired
to) make sustainable/entrepreneurial differences as opposed to helping out/volunteering in an ad-hoc
fashion. However, there was one
fundamental difference between
the men's and women's responses.
While the primary motivation for
male students was to "make a difference," female students stated their
top motivation was to "become a
global professional." The majority
of the men wanted to make a difference, apply their knowledge, and
develop their professional skills to
become ready and more competitive
for their careers in industry. Women,
on the other hand, were consistently
interested in pursuing HESE as the
springboard for a career. One 4thyear student recalls,
IEEE TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIETY MAGAZINE

I distinctly remember returning
home to my dorm after hearing
about the HESE program for
the first time. I excitedly told
my roommate, "This is what I
want to do for the rest of my
life." That was my sophomore
year and I have been involved
in the program ever since.
The full results of this formal
qualitative study are published in
the Winter 2016 Edition of Advances
in Engineering Education [3]. This
article shares some of the behindthe-scenes observations and strategies that have proven successful to
recruit, engage, retain, and propel
women on their engineering career
trajectories. A detailed examination
of the HESE program, its successes,
challenges, and structure can also be
found in the Winter 2016 Edition of
Advances in Engineering Education
[8]. We have included quotes from
our students that reflect how important, meaningful, and formative
real-world opportunities like HESE
are to their education. Though the
HESE program is small when compared to the engineering student
body, our study of the motivations
is significant because these observations have been consistently apparent
over the past decade of the program's
operation, and during that time period
participation of women stayed above
50% of the total. The observations
detailed here have implications
for engineering and entrepreneurship education systems as well as
large corporations, governmental
agencies, and other societal actors
that want to attract and retain women
in their organizations.

#1 Focus on Purpose
Current undergraduate students and
particularly those in the millennial
generation, men and women alike,
are driven by more than money; they
want to see the impact of their work
∕

DECEMBER 2017

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