What do we know about engineering students who are parents?

Published by Julie Smith, PhD, IACE

About one-fifth of undergraduate students are parents, and these students are likely to differ somewhat from other students. However, little research has been conducted on engineering students who are parents.

For work conducted as part of the Engineering PLUS Alliance funded by the National Science Foundation, we explored data from the U.S. 2020 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study. We wanted to determine how engineering students who are parents differ from other engineering students. In this study presented at FIE 2024 in Washington, DC, our research question was:

How do engineering students who are parents differ from other engineering students?

We found that engineering students are far less likely than other students to be parents (6% v. 18%). Engineering students who are parents differ from other engineering students. They are more likely to be older, to be men, to be Black or African American, to have a job, to attend school part-time, and to attend a nonselective college or a two-year college. They are also more likely to have no funding for tuition other than a credit card and to experience food insecurity. Surprisingly, they are less likely to attend a school that offers child care.

However, engineering students do not significantly differ with respect to their status as parents with regard to disability status or in their likelihood of having a high or low GPA. This final finding is particularly important. Research that analyzes the experiences of some groups – including student parents – often assumes a deficit framework. That is, the differences between groups may be assumed to stem from problems within some groups. This framing may cause problems if group members are blamed for the discrepancy between their performance and that of others, while their potential strengths are given little attention. Thus, we feel it is important to focus on strengths as well as challenges faced by student parents.

Our findings indicate that engineering students who are parents face unique challenges, such as financial insecurity. However, they also demonstrate notable strengths—for example, maintaining GPAs comparable to their peers despite the many demands on their time. Additionally, the high proportion of Black engineering students among student parents suggests that supporting this group more effectively could be a meaningful way to improve representation in engineering education.

Our goal is to study with engineering students to determine current barriers and how institutions can support those who are parents.

You can learn more about our work in our 2024 FIE paper, Landscape of Student Parents Studying Engineering. Cite this work as follows: Smith, J. M. (2024, October). Landscape of Student Parents Studying Engineering. In 2024 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE) (pp. 1-7). IEEE.

This work is supported by the National Science Foundation under award HRD-2119930. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.