Getting to gender parity in the Mechanical Engineering Department at MIT

Abstract

Consistently ranked as home to one of the world's top engineering programs, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is often seen as a model for its undergraduate education programs and research output. But MIT leads in another important way: the Institute also boasts one of the most gender-balanced STEM-oriented undergraduate student bodies in the world. The purpose of the study was to help illuminate how the Mechanical Engineering Department in particular has reached near parity in its female undergraduate population: in 2015, females composed 46.4% of declared mechanical engineering majors. This study's approach was twofold: first, the gender enrollments in the largest mechanical engineering elective classes over the past 15 years were analyzed to determine differences, if any, in the subfields that female and male students choose to devote further study to. Second, a cross section of mechanical engineering faculty and staff were interviewed to evaluate how the department has changed over a similar timespan to make the place a much more welcoming place for women now. The data analysis revealed that a larger fraction of undergraduate males in the department take the robotics and the controls classes than females do, but an increasing fraction of females in the department have taken the robotics class over time. The interview analysis presented several factors that contributed to the gender parity in the department over time, including changed hiring practices, role modeling, and careful attention to classroom dynamics. Ultimately, it is hoped that the findings in this thesis can help both the department and other institutions continue their paths to greater gender balance in their engineering programs.