At Smith College, graduation was a little different this month. Diplomas were given to the first class of engineering majors to graduate from a women’s college in the United States.
Before the ceremony, some of the 20 students in the program said they were bewildered by the national attention they have attracted. Over the past few weeks, they have become celebrities in the world of engineering, receiving praise from the leaders of corporations including Hewlett-Packard and Ford.
“They’re making us out to be rock stars,” said Elizabeth Bartell, one of the graduates.
Smith’s milestone is significant because men far outnumber women in most engineering programs, even though many colleges reached gender parity long ago in other mathematics and science programs. According to a popular theory, traditional engineering schools have failed to attract more women because most of the programs do not explore the discipline’s relevance to social issues until the third or fourth year of study.
Smith’s Picker Engineering program, founded in 1999, took a different approach. Instead of piling equations and formulas on first-year students, it offered them introductory classes that explore ways in which engineers can improve society, such as by designing safer public-transportation systems and environmentally friendly buildings.
“We were able to elevate the study of humanities and social sciences to the same level as math and physical sciences in the education of engineers,” said Domenico Grasso, the program’s director. “Many of my colleagues don’t agree with me on this, but I believe that was just as significant as the fact that the program was all-female.”
The interdisciplinary program attracted unlikely students, including some who had aspired to become fashion designers or lawyers. A few of them became hooked on engineering after just one course.
More-traditional engineering schools often lose students after the first year, but Smith’s program had no casualties. The college expects next year’s graduating class to be 30 percent bigger than this year’s.
Wider Appeal
In an effort to broaden the appeal of engineering programs for students, the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology loosened its requirements in 2000, giving colleges more freedom to determine the most appropriate curricula for their students. Without that change, the Smith program would not have been possible, Mr. Grasso says.
George D. Peterson, director of the board, said he expected Smith’s example to have a ripple effect. “Other programs will look at Smith as a beacon,” he said. “Their program illustrates that you can be creative and innovative in developing engineering programs that are sound and robust,” he said.
Several institutions have already contacted Smith about its program, Mr. Grasso said, including Sweet Briar College, in Virginia.
Smith’s first engineers have various plans. Danielle An-chi Tsou will take some time off to study martial arts in China for a year before attending the University of California at Berkeley, where she will pursue a Ph.D. in biomechanical engineering. Ms. Bartell plans to help design transportation systems for an engineering firm in Orlando, Fla.
Christine D. Johnson has accepted a job as a financial consultant in Philadelphia. But first she has to finish a report on the zero-gravity experiments she conducted as part of a recent project sponsored by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
“We hope they skyrocket to important positions in terms of responsibility and impact in engineering,” Mr. Grasso said. “But we tell them, ‘No pressure,’ that it’s just our prediction.”
http://chronicle.com Section: Students Volume 50, Issue 38, Page A34