Latino Women in Engineering: Annotated Bibliography

1. De Welde, K., Laursen, S., Thiry, H. Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM). 10 February 2011.

This is a fact sheet compiled by the Florida Gulf Coast Univeristy and the University of Colorado Boulder. The article takes a look at the education of the women, the employment opportunities, and tries to explain the why there are so few women in engineering. Some of these explanations include class climate, lack of role models, and poor preparation. I will be looking at these explanations to further evaluate why Hispanic women lack role models and why they funnel out of STEM fields.

I found this article while searching Cal Poly’s Poly Cat database. I searched Latino women in engineering and I received multiple articles on statistical analysis.

2. Lewin, David I. Across the Gender Divide: Diversity Among Engineers. Mechanical Engineering-CIME. Oct 1993. Pp 34.

This article summarizes a study made by the Society of Women Engineers, one of the biggest engineering clubs for women, which revealed that only 4.1% were from an underrepresented minority groups. In addition, the survey reveals that there is a higher concentration of minority women in the fields of chemical and environmental engineering. It is interesting to note why these two fields have a higher concentration and why latino women decide to enter these fields, rather than, for example, mechanical engineering. These statistics provide information that could further my research as to why Hispanic women are so underrepresented in engineering fields.

3. Towns, Marcy H. Where are the women of color? Data on African America, Hispanic, and Native American faculty in STEM. Journal of College Science Teaching. March-April 2010, p.8

The National Science Foundation provided statistics on the representation of women of color. These include Asian, African American, Hispanic and Native American women. The article emphasizes that the lack of role models for these women builds barriers and effects the self-esteem of the women in STEM fields. In addition, it evaluates reasons why women tend to lack role models, such as the importance of a family to a latino women, the overall mentality that these women should stay at home and let their husbands be the bread winners, and the poor education latino women receive during middle and high school.

4. Moreno, Susan and Muller, Chandra. Success and Diversity: The Transition through First-Year Calculus in the University. American Journal of Education, Vol. 108, No. 1. The University of Chicago Press. 02 Oct. 2011.

The University of Texas saw the need to develop Engineering Programs to retain the Latino students they admit. These programs heavily influence the performance of calculus in the first year of engineering students. The results suggest that in order to increase the number of students choosing STEM fields, administrators must seek ways to increase students’ participation in calculus each semester. These students will excel in calculus if they receive appropriate support. The reason for targeting calculus rather than another subject is due to the fact that calculus is a pre-requisite for most quantitative fields, and most first year engineering students are required to take calculus within their first year. The first year for most of these students are difficult to transition, therefore it is important to target calculus.