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1. Influences of Friends and Family on Women’s Pursuit of Computing: A Sequential Explanatory Design

   Kargarmoakhar, Maral; Ross, Monique; Hazari, Zhara; Weiss, Mark; Georgiopoulos, Michael; Christensen, Ken (July 2019, Hawaii University International Conferences)

   The participation of female students in STEM majors, particularly computing and engineering, has remained low. In this study, our goal is to understand the most important factors influencing female students towards computing majors. We studied the impact of family and friends on four different racial groups including White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian students who chose computing majors (n=1650). The results of the study indicated friends had a positive significant role on White female students’ major decisions. 

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2. Influences of Friends and Family on Women’s Pursuit of Computing: A Sequential Explanatory Design

   Kargarmoakhar, Maral; Ross, Monique; Hazari, Zhara; Weiss, Mark; Georgiopoulos, Michael; Christensen, Ken (June 2019, Hawaii University International Conferences)

   The participation of female students in STEM majors, particularly computing and engineering, has remained low. In this study, our goal is to understand the most important factors influencing female students towards computing majors. We studied the impact of family and friends on four different racial groups including White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian students who chose computing majors (n=1650). The results of the study indicated friends had a positive significant role on White female students’ major decisions. 

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3. Computing Pathways: A Quantitative Inquiry into the Dynamic Pathways of Students in Computing with Gender Comparisons

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--34322  

   Kargarmoakhar, Maral; Ross, Monique; Hazari, Zahra; Weiss, Mark; Georgiopoulos, Michael; Christensen, Ken; Solis, Tiana (June 2020, 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference)

   The number of female students in computing fields remain low despite the millions of dollars spent on research for attracting more female students. In order to attract more female students to these male dominated fields, we first have to understand in which educational years we are losing female students. For the purpose of this study, we utilized the data from [title blinded for anonymity] an NSF funded study. Approximately, 1650 students from three large public universities in Florida participated in this survey. The survey contained 39 questions around identity, field of study, as well as fields they wanted to pursue during middle school, high school, and college. The responses gathered through the Qualtrics survey system were analyzed in R by the research team. The research questions that guided this study were: (1) To what extent are female students interested in computing related fields at middle school, the beginning of high school, and the beginning of college? (2) How have these occupational pursuits changed over time? Do they differ for gender? The results of the study indicated a majority of female students that were attracted to the computing fields during middle school remained in those fields during high school and college years. However, there was no significant flow from other majors to the computing fields observed during the different educational years. 

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4. Examining the Computing Identity of High-Achieving Underserved Computing Students on the Basis of Gender, Field, and Year in School

   Garcia, A; Ross, M; Hazari, Z; Weiss, M; Christensen, K; Georgiopoulos, M. (April 2018, Collaborative Network for Engineering and Computing Diversity (CoNECD))

   As technology increases in the global arena and the necessity for a more diverse group of individuals to fulfill engineering and computing roles increases, it is important to engage more students in computing majors and roles. Identity has proven to be an important lens through which researchers can better understand how to engage students in these fields. In particular, our framing for computing identity includes students’ self-perceptions about recognition, interest, and performance/competence. Using survey data, this study examines the computing identity of high achieving underserved students in computer science (CS), computer engineering (CE), and information technology (IT). For these students, we compare the constructs between men and women, computing fields, and freshmen and juniors/seniors. Based on preliminary data, results show that female participants had less of a computing identity than male students, specifically with respect to computing recognition and overall computing identity. Students in IT programs had less of an overall computing identity than students in CS and CE. Finally, freshmen were lower on their overall computing identities and specifically performance/competence beliefs and interest. These results suggest that even within computing programs, students differ in their computing identities. Furthermore, there are different constructs related to computing identity that vary for different subgroups of students. While these results are insightful, future work will compare the computing identities of high achieving underserved students with a larger population of computing students as well as strategies for building their computing identities. 

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5. Examining the Computing Identity of High-Achieving Underserved Computing Students on the Basis of Gender, Field, and Year in School

   Garcia, A.; Ross, M.; Hazari, Z.; Solis, T.; Weiss, M.; Christensen, K.; Georgiopoulos, M. (April 2018, The Collaborative Network for Engineering and Computing Diversity Conference (CoNECD))

   As technology increases in the global arena and the necessity for a more diverse group of individuals to fulfill engineering and computing roles increases, it is important to engage more students in computing majors and roles. Identity has proven to be an important lens through which researchers can better understand how to engage students in these fields. In particular, our framing for computing identity includes students’ self-perceptions about recognition, interest, and performance/competence. Using survey data, this study examines the computing identity of high achieving underserved students in computer science (CS), computer engineering (CE), and information technology (IT). For these students, we compare the constructs between men and women, computing fields, and freshmen and juniors/seniors. Based on preliminary data, results show that female participants had less of a computing identity than male students, specifically with respect to computing recognition and overall computing identity. Students in IT programs had less of an overall computing identity than students in CS and CE. Finally, freshmen were lower on their overall computing identities and specifically performance/competence beliefs and interest. These results suggest that even within computing programs, students differ in their computing identities. Furthermore, there are different constructs related to computing identity that vary for different subgroups of students. While these results are insightful, future work will compare the computing identities of high achieving underserved students with a larger population of computing students as well as strategies for building their computing identities. 

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