Project title: Making And Knowledge Exchange for Repair & Sustainability (MAKERS)
Funding awarded: £89,247
Summary:
The project aims to improve belonging for minoritised engineering students at UWE Bristol, through developing connections with local maker and repair communities in the West of England. Through co-development and repair workshops with local groups, students will be brought together in a purposeful and practical environment to form a student community founded upon peer support and friendship. Students will add value to communities, solving local problems and fixing broken goods.
What need does the project address?
This project aims to improve representation and belonging in engineering for women and people from Black, Asian or minority ethnic groups, alongside intersectional backgrounds of lower socio-economic status. Women make up only 16% of engineers, and those from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds make up only 7% of engineers in employment. Research indicates being from a minoritised group may mean students feel out of place, isolated, or unable to reveal or fulfil their complete identity. This results in lower recruitment rates, degree non-completion, lower salaries, and ultimately higher rates of leaving engineering.
STEM activities that draw on wider societal or environmental purposes (communal goals) are more attractive to women. Maker projects have been shown to improve identity and agency in STEM for Black men and encourage engagement for people from other minority ethnic groups. This sits alongside the climate and ecological emergency, with UWE students indicating a desire to make a difference locally.
Furthermore, the COVID-19 pandemic has isolated all students, with a resulting rise in mental health issues. Communal creative activities generate a psychological state of ‘flow’, which has therapeutic benefits for mental health issues.
UWE believes that community maker activities will enable students to draw on multiple identities. For example, this could allow them to contribute to projects with minority ethnic communities. It is predicted that this will help develop diverse identities as student engineers, and thus improve belonging, agency, and retention in engineering.
What will the students experience?
The shared projects will bring students together in a purposeful and practical environment, to form a student community founded upon peer support and friendship. Students will also add value to communities, solving community-generated problems and fixing broken goods. Students will gain practical skills and informal mentoring by working intergenerationally, alongside community members recruited through Bristol Repair Café network and industry STEM Ambassadors. We aim to support student agency to develop their own projects that align with their full identity, such as textiles, art and design, digital engineering, or DIY maintenance.
What are the expected outcomes?
Students from UWE are predicted to feel an increased sense of belonging and agency; and grow passionate about pursuing an engineering career. As students have been consulted and are co-creators of the project, progress and impact will be measured throughout to allow for optimum benefit and impact.