Engineering Students' Social Networks and Alters During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Social capital is essential to students' success and persistence in academic goals. However, during the period of emergency remote teaching brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, students were isolated from their social networks. The purpose of this study was to examine how engineering students' social capital changed during the period of emergency remote teaching, looking closely at both the instrumental and expressive social capital from the people (alters) in students' social networks. We used an explanatory sequential mixed method approach that included collecting data from first-year students and capstone design students using the Undergraduate Support Survey and student interviews. We found differences between the types of alters that the two groups of students identified as influential to their success and persistence, including the groups of alters they identified (e.g., professors vs peers) and the length of relationship with their alters. We also present results from the interviews, highlighting examples of expressive and instrumental supports in both group before and during the pandemic. Overall, we found that the advanced students had more well-developed social networks than the first-year students to rely on during the transition. The first-year students, however, relied mostly on lifelong relationships. They did not have, and did not continue to develop, university-based social networks. We include examples of innovative ways that students maintained and strengthened their social networks and point to future implications of this work. © 2022 Tempus Publications. All rights reserved.