NEWS

OFORI-BOADU RECEIVES NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION (NSF) GRANT ($201,413): 2022 - 2027

Collaborative Research: Connecting Professional and Educational Communities to Prepare Construction Engineering Students for the Workplace

In collaboration with Dr. Abiola Akanmu and other PIs from Virginia Tech, this project is designed to create a collaborative network (called ConPEC) to investigate how the accessibility of construction industry practitioners to instructors, influences construction engineering students’ disciplined perception and professional identity development. The ConPEC platform will employ machine learning algorithms and complex data analysis to allow for pairing instructors with their community of practice.

To achieve this, the research will first investigate the practical course-support needs of construction engineering instructors and the characteristics of industry practitioners. Next, the ConPEC framework will be designed to include learning-driven algorithms to exploit dynamic matching patterns between instructors and industry practitioners. Finally, the team will use semi-structured interviews with both students and industry practitioners to gather qualitative data that will be analyzed using Grounded Theory. The research team will examine changes in students’ disciplined perception and professional identity development.

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF HOME BUILDERS (NAHB) RECOGNIZES OFORI-BOADU AND EBEW CENTER AS PART OF 2023 NAHB INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY CELEBRATION

Read Full Article at the Link below:

Women Play a Key Role in Building Construction Career Pathways - NAHB

OFORI-BOADU RECEIVES EAST COAST CONSTRUCTION SERVICES (ECCS) GRANT ($20,000): 2023 - 2024

THE EMERGING BUILT ENVIRONMENT WOMEN CENTER:

Research and Outreach to Broaden Women Participation in

Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) Professions

Through this EBEW Center, the objective is to implement a year-round ‘womfessionalized’ Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Professional Development Program (wAEC-PDP) to catalyze AEC-PID processes in undergraduate AEC women. The co-construction of grounded theories will increase understanding of how women develop professional identities towards AEC professions through wAEC-PDPs - which incorporate mentoring as a key strategy. Scholarships and other resources will be provided to undergraduate AEC women. Physical makerspaces and virtual spaces will engage pre-college girls in meaningful visual-kinesthetic experiences to attract and retain their AEC career interests.

OFORI-BOADU RECEIVES NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION (NSF) CAREER GRANT - $559,991

CAREER: Integrated Research and Education for Professional Identity Development in Undergraduate Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) Women

NSF ABSTRACT Link: NSF Award Search: Award # 1845979 - CAREER: Integrated Research and Education for Professional Identity Development in Undergraduate Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) Women

The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) program is a National Science Foundation-wide activity that offers awards in support of junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education, and the integration of education and research within the context of the mission of their organizations. This project awarded to a CAREER scholar at North Carolina A&T State University has the goal to understand the professional identity development (PID) processes of emerging women professionals in the fields or architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) towards informing educational and institutional transformations that strengthen women's persistence in becoming AEC professionals. This project integrates research and education by developing a year-round blended Professional Development Certificate Program (PDCP) and establishing the Emerging Built Environment Women (EBEW) center. This award is supported by the Historically Black Colleges and Universities - Undergraduate Program. HBCU-UP encourages STEM education research that generates foundational knowledge in broadening participation.

To achieve the goal of this project, robust foundational grounded theories will be constructed to provide nuanced insights into why and how the multiple identities, lived experiences and major concerns of undergraduate AEC women interact with their PID process. A multi-year, multi-site, and multi-method constructivist approach to grounded theory research will be utilized with primary data obtained from intensive interviews with critical incident and symbolic interactionist emphasis. The comparative and iterative synthesis of coded and emergent data obtained from a cohort of undergraduate AEC women from five institutions over a four-year period will provide a longitudinal understanding of why and how their views and actions change with their lived experiences across educational stages. Methodological triangulation methods of data include textual analysis of formal documents and open-ended question surveys. Emergent theories from the research will inform practical implementation of the PDCP and the EBWE center and subsequent findings will provide greater insights into research findings. The construction of robust discipline-specific PID process theories will bridge gaps in identity and diversity theories and inform transformations for more gender inclusive AEC educational and institutional environments, which will enhance the early awareness, attraction, preparation, and persistence of the next generation of women AEC professionals. Theoretical foundations will guide future identity and diversity research that can be extended to other persistent male-dominant STEM disciplines. Improved gender inclusive environments will expand the pool of qualified AEC women for a more diverse AEC workforce.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.