"For much of America's history, African Americans were discouraged or aggressively prevented from becoming scientists and engineers. Those who did enter STEM fields found that their inventions and discoveries were often neither recognized nor valued. Even today, particularly in the field of engineering, the participation of African American men and women is shockingly low, and some evidence indicates that the situation might be getting worse. In Changing the Face of Engineering, twenty-four eminent scholars address the underrepresentation of African Americans in engineering from a wide variety of disciplinary and professional perspectives while proposing workable classroom solutions and public policy initiatives. They combine robust statistical analyses with personal narratives of African American engineers and STEM instructors who, by taking evidenced-based approaches, have found success in graduating African American engineers. Changing the Face of Engineering argues that the continued underrepresentation of African Americans in engineering impairs the ability of the United States to compete successfully in the global marketplace. This volume will be of interest to STEM scholars and students, as well as policymakers, corporations, and higher education institutions"-- Provided by publisher. "The underrepresentation of African Americans in STEM fields in general, and in engineering in particular, according to John Slaughter "is at best benign neglect, and at worst active discrimination." In one of the first broad-based studies of the African American experience in engineering, Slaughter and his coeditors set out to describe the problem and propose workable solutions in the form of education and public policy initiatives. In this book, twenty-four eminent scholars address this shortfall from a wide variety of disciplinary angles. They draw insight from robust statistical analyses and contextualized analyses grounded in personal narratives of African American engineers and instructors at a diverse set of research institutions with evidenced-based approaches to their success in graduating African American engineers. This definitive volume will certainly be of interest to scholars and policymakers"-- Provided by publisher.
Includes bibliographical references and index.