TY - JOUR
T1 - The Socialization of STEM Professionals Into STEM Careers
T2 - A Study of Newly Hired Engineers
AU - Korte, Russell
AU - Brunhaver, Samantha
AU - Zehr, Sarah M.
N1 - Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: We are grateful to the newly hired engineers and their managers who agreed to participate in this study and to the Center for the Advancement of Engineering Education that originally supported the data collection funded by the National Science Foundation Grant ESI-0227558.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2018.
PY - 2019/2/1
Y1 - 2019/2/1
N2 - The Problem: Recently there has been a growing interest to increase the number of people entering science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers. One of the major problems with this “supply-side” model is that it sees STEM workforce development narrowly as one of inputs (recruitment) and ignores the practice of STEM work, which affects the retention of professionals in STEM careers. The Solution: Informed by recent research and theory on career development, we studied the work experiences of newly hired engineers in one organization. A key finding is that a major part of their experiences involved organizational work and social dynamics outside of what many considered to be “real” engineering work. We propose that these experiences provide important insights for the education and retention of STEM workers. The Stakeholders: Faculty in higher education that prepare STEM workers, managers in organizations that hire new STEM workers, and aspiring STEM workers.
AB - The Problem: Recently there has been a growing interest to increase the number of people entering science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers. One of the major problems with this “supply-side” model is that it sees STEM workforce development narrowly as one of inputs (recruitment) and ignores the practice of STEM work, which affects the retention of professionals in STEM careers. The Solution: Informed by recent research and theory on career development, we studied the work experiences of newly hired engineers in one organization. A key finding is that a major part of their experiences involved organizational work and social dynamics outside of what many considered to be “real” engineering work. We propose that these experiences provide important insights for the education and retention of STEM workers. The Stakeholders: Faculty in higher education that prepare STEM workers, managers in organizations that hire new STEM workers, and aspiring STEM workers.
KW - career development
KW - human resource development
KW - newcomer experiences
KW - organizational socialization
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U2 - 10.1177/1523422318814550
DO - 10.1177/1523422318814550
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85058630335
SN - 1523-4223
VL - 21
SP - 92
EP - 113
JO - Advances in Developing Human Resources
JF - Advances in Developing Human Resources
IS - 1
ER -