BPE-Track 1: Collaborative Research: Planning: Developing Accessible Pathways to Civil Engineering Industry for Students with Disabilities: Initiating Partnerships with Industry

To address the critical need for a more diverse and inclusive engineering workforce, this project will establish a pioneering university-industry-student partnership aimed at facilitating equitable access and transition into civil engineering careers for individuals with disabilities. Despite calls from the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health, people with disabilities remain severely underrepresented in STEM fields.

In industry, engineers with disabilities constitute less than 10 percent of the workforce and are less likely to be employed than non-disabled engineers; those who are employed generally experience lower pay. To-date, scholarship examining the accessibility of academic institutions has focused on the programmatic experiences of undergraduate engineering students with disabilities, with little to no work continuing past the point of graduation.

As a result, this project, aligned with the National Science Foundation's commitment to fostering inclusivity and innovation in engineering education, represents a pivotal step towards broadening the participation of engineers with disabilities in the civil engineering industry. Focused within the civil engineering sector, pivotal to national infrastructure development, this endeavor will lay the groundwork for transformative programming supporting disabled students' transition from academia to professional practice.

People with disabilities have been referred to as “the original lifehackers” due to the innovative ways they alter everyday products, systems, and spaces to access a world not built for them. While innovation and problem solving are core competencies in engineering, the role of people with disabilities as engineers has not been realized for many reasons.

These reasons include social and professional stigma and a lack of support structures that facilitate the entry of engineering graduates with disabilities into the workforce. Beyond diversification, the project aspires to promote genuine inclusion, illuminating the underrepresented cohort of disabled engineering students and laying foundational steps for accessible engineering education and practice.

This planning grant will contribute to a deeper understanding of existing scholarship and current industry perspectives, provide a framework for developing partnerships between academia and industry, and blaze a trail forward for creating a more diverse and inclusive engineering workforce through the following outcomes: (1) synthesizing relevant literature; (2) identifying and engaging industry stakeholders to explore collaborative tensions and synergies among industry stakeholders; and (3) developing a robust research agenda for the next phases of the project. In Phase 1, we will employ systematic review techniques to conduct a literature review to examine the research landscape of the engineering school-to-work transition, industry practices for hiring people with disabilities, and university/industry partnerships.

In Phase 2, we will conduct interviews to help us foster interpersonal relationships with the industry partners recruited in Phase 1. In Phase 3, we will apply the outcomes identified in Phases 1 and 2 to establish a robust research agenda for project continuation. By bridging academia and industry, this research will enrich scholarship, provide a framework for sustainable partnerships, and foster a more inclusive engineering workforce.

Moreover, this initiative holds broader impacts by pioneering inclusive career pathways that destigmatize disability in industry, promoting transparency, and emphasizing the unique contributions of individuals with disabilities in infrastructure design. Most importantly, it will provide the critical first steps to creating inclusive and accessible pathways to and through engineering for all engineering students.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.