Pre-College Engineering Participation Among First-Year Engineering Students

In recent years, engineering content is increasingly appearing in the K-12 classroom. As pre-college engineering programs grow, first-year engineering students are arriving in university engineering programs with significant prior exposure to engineering content and practices. In this paper, we present the results of a survey of first-year engineering students on their participation in pre-college engineering programs and activities. Students enrolled in four sections of a first-year engineering program at a large public university were asked to complete a survey indicating the settings where they encountered engineering prior to college, named and described the various activities that they participated in and the approximate amount of time they spent doing each activity. Participants also provided demographic information. Results indicate that 89 percent of domestic students enrolling in first-year engineering classes at the university have experiences they describe as engineering prior to college. High school classes are the most common way that students are exposed to engineering content by a significant margin, followed by extra-curricular activities, summer camps or programs, and middle school classes. While the majority of respondents reported participating in one or two different activities, some reported participating in as many as nine different pre-college engineering programs or activities.