The research project is an engineering-based project centred around the feelings of engineering students and if they feel accepted and valued at their institution of study. Engineering students face many challenges during their time at university but improving their support system and helping them feel as though they ‘belong’ will help students feel empowered to scale success. Through this research project, a diverse group of engineering students of different years will be interviewed to perform a reflexive thematic analysis of the interview transcripts to identify common themes. This will then be used to build a mental map and model and compare the feelings to those of non-engineering students. The findings will be integrated into an ongoing project that is exploring ‘sense of belonging’ in international students who are studying at the University of Leeds and will feed into the student success initiatives locally within Schools in the Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences and more broadly at the University-level.
A Sense of Belonging in Engineering Students
My first year research project - exploring how valued and accepted students under the Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences feel.