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Chris Plouff Grand Valley State University

Socialization of Undergraduate Engineering Students into Professional Industrial Settings through a Cooperative Education Program Preliminary Results. Chris Plouff Grand Valley State University. Thoughts…. Remember what it was like to first begin dating? Remember high school dances?

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Chris Plouff Grand Valley State University

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  1. Socialization of Undergraduate Engineering Students into Professional Industrial Settings through a Cooperative Education ProgramPreliminary Results Chris Plouff Grand Valley State University

  2. Thoughts… Remember what it was like to first begin dating? Remember high school dances? What do you look for in a partner and how do you make decisions about relationships? 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  3. Presentation Points • What is Socialization? • Key Terms Defined • Why Study Student Socialization? • Goals of the Research Project • Significance of the Research Project • Organizational Theory Primer • Research Study Overview • Results • Conclusions • Limitations/Future Research 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  4. What is Socialization? The interaction between a stable social system and the member who enters it. Socialization refers to the process by which required behavior patterns of the society, organization, or group that he or she is entering are learned (Schein, 1970). 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  5. Key Terms Defined Organization: Collectivities oriented to the pursuit of relatively specific goals and exhibiting relatively highly formalized social structures (Scott, 1998). Field: The existence of a community of organizations that partakes of a common meaning system and whose participants interact more frequently and fatefully with one another than with actors outside of the field (Scott, 1994). 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  6. Key Terms Defined Profession: A collective group that exercises control by defining social reality, by devising ontological frameworks, proposing distinctions, creating typifications, and fabricating principles or guidelines for action (Scott & Backman, 1990). Professions construct cognitive frameworks that define arenas within which they claim jurisdiction and seek to exercise control (Scott, 2001). 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  7. Key Terms Defined Values: Conceptions of the preferred or desirable, together with the construction of standards to which existing structures or behaviors can be compared and assessed (Scott, 2001). Norms: Specify how things should be done; they define legitimate means to pursue valued ends (Scott, 2001) Roles: Conceptions of appropriate goals and activities for particular individuals or specified social positions. Beliefs are prescriptions of how the specified actors are supposed to behave (Scott, 2001). 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  8. Key Terms Defined Culture: A pattern of basic assumptions, invented, discovered or developed by a given group, as it learns to cope with its problems of external adaptation and internal integration, that has worked well enough to be considered valid and, therefore is to be taught to new members as the correct way to perceive, think, and feel in relation to those problems (Schein, 1990). 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  9. Why Study Student Socialization? Student Perspective: • learning outcomes not likely accomplished (at least to the intended level going into the work event) • satisfaction with the experience unlikely • potential for dissatisfaction with the chosen academic and career fields increases • self esteem and confidence in the ability to succeed may be negatively impacted 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  10. Why Study Student Socialization? Employer Perspective: • lower productivity from the student • negative morale that could influence current full-time employees and other future students that may want to work for the organization • greatly limited potential for retention of the student after the experience thereby minimizing the return on investment 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  11. Goal of the Research Project Investigate cooperative education as an organizational phenomenon (from an anthropological and sociological perspective). Goal: To better understand the processes that students experience when participating in cooperative education experiences so that the preparation of both student and organization will result in better, more meaningful, and effective experiences. 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  12. Significance of the Research Project Most research in this area has focused on learning outcomes Some Exceptions: (Brown, 1985; Garavan and Murphy, 2001; Kirby, 1990; Major and Kozlowski, 1997; Nixon, 1989; Parsons and Caylor, 2004/2005) Provide an organizational-based conceptual framework of the cooperative education process. 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  13. Organizational Theory Primer Organizations are about people, not buildings or facilities. An organization is not a physical entity, but rather consists of relationships between and among people and the processes that are used to maintain the desired relationships. (Barott, 2002) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  14. Organizational Theory Primer Three layers of Culture (Kuh & Whitt, 1988; Schein, 1992): Outer layer: consists of the organization’s artifacts (physical layout of the organization, the dress code, stories, myths, symbols) Middle layer: consists of espoused values (articulated beliefs about what is “good,” what “works,” and what is “right.”) Inner core: consists of underlying assumptions (deepest ingrained assumptions that are rarely questioned and taken-for-granted) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  15. Organizational Theory Primer Three elements (or pillars) of institutions: regulative systems, normative systems, and cultural-cognitive systems. Regulative systems: include establishing rules, monitoring conformity to them, and manipulating sanctions (rewards or punishments) in an attempt to influence future behavior. Normative systems: “define goals or objectives…and designate appropriate ways to pursue them” (values and norms) Cultural-cognitive systems: recognizes the “shared conceptions that constitute the nature of social reality and the frames through which meaning is made” Scott (2001) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  16. Organizational Theory Primer Carriers are the processes that institutions employ to transmit their messages: symbolic systems, relational systems, routines, artifacts (Scott, 2001) Symbolic systems: refer to conventional aspects of culture, including rules and values, as well as newer conceptions of symbolic schemata including models, classifications, representations, and logics. Relational systems: “rely on patterned expectations connected to networks of social positions: role systems” 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  17. Organizational Theory Primer Carriers are the processes that institutions employ to transmit their messages: symbolic systems, relational systems, routines, artifacts (Scott, 2001) Routines: “carriers that rely on patterned actions that reflect the tacit knowledge of actors: deeply ingrained habits and procedures based on inarticulated knowledge and beliefs” Artifacts: “material culture,” and include complex technologies embodied in hardware and software. Artifacts accommodate structure and action, and are therefore both products of human action and, once created and deployed, a part of the objective, structural properties of the situation. 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  18. Organizational Theory Primer • Entry into an organization “is a process of breaking in and joining up, of learning the ropes, of figuring out how to get along and how to make it” (Van Maanen, 1975) • Three stage process: • Entry: individual preparation and training, recruitment and selection, hiring decisions, and initial job placement; • Socialization: the early process of learning the ropes and finding out how to make it in the organization, mutual testing between the individual and organization; • Mutual Acceptance – the processes of formally and informally obtaining and granting full membership in the organization (Schein, 1978). 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  19. Organizational Theory Primer Socialization is the process by which a culture reproduces itself. Socialization by an organization is supported by rules and regulations, cognitive categories and schemes, and norms/values (Barott, 2002). Stage 1: confronting and accepting organizational reality Stage 2: achieving role clarity Stage 3: locating within the organizational context Stage 4: detecting signposts of successful socialization (Wanous, 1992) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  20. Organizational Theory Primer Seven dimensions of organizational socialization processes: Group vs. Individual Formal vs.Informal Sequential vs. Random Fixed vs.Variable Serial vs. Disjunctive Reconstructing vs.Self-enhancing Tournament vs. Contest (Van Maanen & Schein, 1979; Schein, 1990) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  21. Organizational Theory Primer Three outcomes of socialization processes (Schein, 1990): 1. Custodial: total conformity to norms and learning of assumptions (formal, self-reconstructing, serial, sequential, variable, tournament) 2. Creative Individualism: all central assumptions of the culture learned, all peripheral ones rejected, allowing creativity (informal, self-enhancing, random, disjunctive, fixed, contest) 3. Rebellion: total rejection of assumptions 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  22. Activity The Co-op Dating Game 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  23. Research Study Overview Research Questions • What are the daily experiences of a cooperative education student? • What experiences and processes does a student encounter when they move from the academic to the work environment through a cooperative education program? • What experiences and values did students have prior to entering the cooperative education event that were influential in the student’s move from outside to inside the organization? • How does academic training prior to the work experience impact the transition to the work environment? 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  24. Research Study Overview Research Questions • What programs and/or processes (formal or informal) are used by organizations to bring students from outside to inside the organization? • How are cooperative education students socialized to the field? the organization? the profession? roles? • How do students in a cooperative education program learn about what they need to do? • How are the experiences during each cooperative education semester instrumental in helping a student understand their roles and the norms of the organization? • Can the induction and socialization process for students into experiential education programs be predicted? 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  25. Research Study Overview Target consists of understanding the activities of engineering students participating in a cooperative education program within the School of Engineering at GSU. Cooperative education at GSU: • required for engineering students • full-time for three separate, four-month long semesters • work with the same organization throughout • alternating semester format • the last two years of the academic program. 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  26. Research Study Overview School of Engineering (SOE) at Great State University (GSU): • bachelor of science in engineering degree with emphases in computer, electrical, interdisciplinary, manufacturing, and mechanical engineering • master of science degrees in mechanical and manufacturing engineering are currently offered. • approximately 650 undergraduate and 50 graduate students in SOE, and 19 terminal-degreed faculty. 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  27. Research Study Overview Sampling: • students who began their first co-op semesters in Summer of 2000 through Summer of 2002 • all four emphases (mechanical, manufacturing, electrical and computer engineering) included • study narrowed to include one yearly cycle (2001 start time) • purposeful sampling was used to learn in-depth information about representative individual cases • snowball sampling of GSU SOE faculty was used beginning with the dean of the college • purposeful sampling of company/organization representatives participating in the cooperative education program based on the information gathered in the student portion of the study 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  28. Research Study Overview Data Collection: Review of Artifacts/Documents: • academic records (transcripts, etc.) • evaluations completed by students and worksite supervisors • journals written by students 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  29. Research Study Overview Data Collection: Interviewing: • 21 students 7 ME, 9 EE, 3 CE, 1 EE/CE, 1 BUS 19 male, 2 female 20 Caucasian, 1 Asian 18 from near GSU, 3 others from same state GPA range 2.68 to 3.88 (avg. 3.28) 19 unique co-op organizations 9 unique post-graduation employers 10 hired-on with co-op employer, 10 hired-on with new employer 1 left the engineering program (graduated in business) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  30. Research Study Overview Data Collection: Interviewing: • 16 employer representatives 14 male, 2 female 16 Caucasian 16 from within 1 hour drive of GSU 9 unique co-op organizations years with employer range 6 to 25 years (avg. 16+ years) • 3 faculty representatives dean of college co-op program coordinator (faculty member for 16 years in ME) chair of EE and CE programs (faculty member for 6 years) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  31. Research Study Overview Data Collection: Organizations: • 24 unique organizations 17 manufacturing- and product-based companies employee size: 7 - 1,000+, 5 – 250 to 1,000, 5 - 250 and below 4 engineering design or engineering service-provider companies employee sizes: 8, 65, 80, 300 1 governmental entity mid-size city of over 100,000 people 1 higher education institution over 20,000 students 1 transportation company over 500 employees 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  32. Results How is it organized? “Leaky Funnel” Modeling the Process 5 stages: 1. pre-entry 2. match-making (co-op position) 3. entry/socialization (co-op position) 4. match-making (post-graduation) 5. accelerated entry/socialization (post-graduation) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  33. Conclusions A fairly comprehensive understanding has been developed of what a student may encounter during the co-op experience The socialization process is fairly predictable and therefore can be modeled and replicated (e.g. metaphorically like dating) This model could be used to better prepare engineering students potentially impacting retention in academic programs and persistence into early career Successful socialization: individual/group, informal, self-enhancing, random, disjunctive, variable, contest-like (similar to creative individualism) 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

  34. Limitations/Future Research Limitations: Lack of diversity in student and employer informant groups Students from one (regional) institution Employer and students from one geographic area Future Research: Talk to more students who did not persist Does co-op impact persistence and success post-graduation Interview non-co-op hires of the same employers 2006 ASEE-CIEC Conference

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