Employee Engagement, Sense of Belonging and Inclusion: Transportation and Stem-Related

Alexander. Women have traditionally been underrepresented within the transit workforce. As career opportunities in transit grow, it is imperative that women are hired and that they succeed in transit jobs. A critical first step to ensure success in these areas is to remove barriers to entry and address challenges women face once employed. Additional resources are needed to help transit agencies overcome barriers to cultivate a desirable workplace for women to find and sustain employment. The objective of this synthesis was to explore the strategies that have been deployed in transit and other related industries in order to attract, retain, and advance women in a variety of roles. A literature review was undertaken, and detailed survey responses of 94 participants were gathered. The report presents an analysis on the state of the practice, emphasizing lessons learned, current practices, challenges, and gaps in information. Five case examples that highlight different approaches taken by transit agencies to attract, retain, and advance, as well as develop, women within their workforce were also developed. This synthesis will assist transit agencies in their efforts to diversify their workforce and specifically build a culture or implement strategies to attract, retain, and advance women.

Ivey, Powers, Clark. Recent studies indicate that organizations with the most diverse workforces reap the rewards of increased efficiency, innovation, and profitability. By definition, diversity encompasses not only traditionally recognized measures—gender, race, and ethnicity—but also age, socioeconomic status, veteran status, orientation, neurodiversity, experiences, and a host of other characteristics. This article looks at strategies to achieve diversity in the transportation workforce. It begins with a discussion of diversity in leadership and diversity's positive impact on recruitment, retention, and organizational performance. Next, diversity challenges are discussed including challenges faced by state departments of transportation such as a lack of awareness of job opportunities; male-dominated occupations; and work schedules incompatible with family responsibilities. Finally, suggestions are outlined for achieving diversity goals including clear leadership, supportive workplace culture, hiring practices, outreach and engagement, collaborative initiatives, and experiential learning.

Godfrey, Bertini. This study synthesized previously conducted research and identified additional research needed to attract, promote, and retain women in the transportation industry. This study will detail major findings and subsequent recommendations, based on the annotated bibliography, of the current atmosphere and the most successful ways to attract and retain young women in the transportation industry in the future. Oftentimes, it is perception that drives women away from the transportation industry, as communal goals are not emphasized in transportation. Men are attracted to agentic goals, whereas women tend to be more attracted to communal goals (Diekman et al., 2011). While this misalignment of goals has been found to be one reason that women tend to avoid the transportation industry, there are ways to highlight the goal congruity processes that contribute to transportation engineering, planning, operations, maintenance, and decisions—thus attracting the most talented individuals, regardless of gender. Other literature has pointed to the lack of female role models and mentors as one reason that it is difficult to attract women to transportation (Dennehy & Dasgupta, 2017). It is encouraging to know that attention is being placed on the attraction and retention of women in all fields, as it will increase the probability that the best individual is attracted to the career that best fits their abilities, regardless of gender.

Wilkinson, Kelly. The Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) and Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI) have partnered in a statewide effort—the Highway Construction Workforce Development Program—to recruit, train, and employ a diverse workforce for highway construction jobs throughout the state. This program, begun in 2010, supports a variety of initiatives designed to improve the recruitment and retention of women and people of color in Oregon’s highway construction trades. The programs evaluated in this report include the following: pre-apprenticeship programs, supportive services providing financial assistance (i.e., fuel assistance; support for overnight travel; childcare; and work clothes, tools, and protective equipment) and supportive services providing non-financial assistance (i.e., counseling, formal mentoring, social support). This report provides findings based on data from the Oregon Apprenticeship System (OAS) and a phone survey, conducted in March of 2018, of current and recently active apprentices.

Crissey. Article from the Commercial Carrier Journal

Wilkinson, Kelly. While white men have historically dominated the highway construction trades in Oregon, this trend is changing: of those enrolled in apprenticeships in the highway construction trades in 2005 81% were white men; in 2015, this number was 70%. Of apprentices who completed an apprenticeship in 2010, 84% were white men; in 2015, this number was 79%. These changes are likely due, in part, to efforts by the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) and the Bureau of Labor Industries (BOLI) to diversify the skilled highway construction workforce through financial and non-financial services to apprentices in eligible trades through the Highway Construction Workforce Development Program. This report assesses the continued efforts of these supports using data from the Oregon Apprenticeship System (OAS) and a phone survey of recently active highway trades apprentices conducted in March of 2016. In addition, we compare these findings to those previously reported in 2014. Specifically, this report aims to explore the following questions: 1) Has the recruitment and retention of women and people of color in highway trades apprenticeships increased since a) the inception of the program in 2010 and b) the previous reporting period in 2014? 2) Has the awareness, use, and evaluation of supportive services changed since the previous reporting period? and 3) What is the impact of supportive services on retention and diversity in the highway trades? The report concludes with a set of recommendations for improvements to the Highway Construction Workforce Development Program and an update to the Performance Measurement System proposed in the 2014 report

Brown, Lerner. Transportation agencies are responsible for the development and support of facilities and systems with service lives that extend into decades and even centuries. For these agencies, knowledge is critical to success—but having the knowledge is not enough to get the job done; people must use their knowledge effectively. This article looks at ways organizations are using management tools that are more people-centered and that enhance the application of people’s knowledge through team-building and fostering positive feelings about the workplace. Examples include, putting people first at Alphabet/Google and Boston Consulting Group, team building at Southwest Airlines, and core values at Zappos.

Cass, Shove, Urry. The purpose of this project was two fold. One aim was to develop and test methods that local authorities might adopt in assessing and thinking about socio-spatial inclusion/exclusion in anticipation of the introduction and impact of road user charging or work place parking levies. Given concern that such measures might have a disproportionate impact on those already disadvantaged in socio-spatial terms, how might the specifically spatial aspects of social exclusion be defined, measured and monitored? And how might the impact of congestion charging schemes be assessed in these terms? A second aim was to draw in and develop recent work on the connections between mobility and social exclusion in order to enrich analysis of the relation between different kinds of socio-spatial access and forms of social exclusion. By socio-spatial we refer to those forms of inclusion/exclusion that are specifically
related to access and mobility.

O'Brien, Bart, Garcia. African Americans and other ethnic minorities are severely underrepresented in both graduate education and among the professoriate in ecology and evolutionary biology (EEB). In the present research, we take a social psychological approach to studying inclusion by examining interrelationships among challenges to inclusion, the sense of belonging, and interest in pursuing graduate education in EEB. We conducted a survey of African American (N = 360), Latino/a/Hispanic (N = 313), White (N = 709), and Asian/Asian American (N = 524) college undergraduates majoring in science, technology, engineering, and math fields and used the results to test several interrelated hypotheses derived from our theoretical model. Compared to Whites, ethnic minorities were more likely to experience challenges to inclusion in EEB (e.g., less exposure to ecology, fewer same-race role models, discomfort in outdoor environments). Challenges to inclusion were associated with a decreased sense of belonging in EEB educational contexts. Finally, experiencing a low sense of belonging in EEB educational contexts was associated with lower interest in pursuing graduate education in EEB. Sense of belonging in EEB was especially low among African Americans relative to Whites. We discuss the implications of the study results for educational interventions.

Belanger, Joshi, et al. A sense of belonging in a particular context is cued not only by the people in the role but by the affordances of the role—that is, the opportunities for goal pursuit. We investigate this role-based belonging in four studies documenting that the perceived affordances of social roles inform sense of belonging and convey known benefits of belonging. Perceiving more communal opportunities in naturalistic science, technology, engineering, and mathematic (STEM) settings was associated with heightened belonging in those roles (Studies 1–2). Experimentally manipulating collaborative activities in a science lab increased anticipated belonging in the lab and fostered interest, particularly among women (Study 3). Finally, mentally simulating communal affordances in a role promoted recovery from belonging threat: Considering communal opportunities in STEM facilitated recovery of STEM-specific belonging after recalling exclusion in STEM (Study 4). Investigations of role-based belonging offer the potential for both theoretical and practical advances.

van Veelen Masculine work contexts form an important source of social identity threat for working women. But what aspect of masculine work contexts is most threatening to women’s gender identity at work: A numerical majority of male colleagues (i.e., numerical male dominance), working in a profession in which women are negatively stereotyped (i.e., normative male dominance), or the combination? The current study aimed to disentangle these two aspects of masculine work contexts by testing its combined impact on the experience of gender identity threat among women and men who work in the STEM sector (i.e., Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). A field study was conducted among women (N = 177) and men (N = 630) graduates holding an academic degree in a STEM educational program. Respondents either worked in- or outside the STEM sector (i.e., stronger vs. weaker gender stereotype) and estimated the ratio of men to women in their direct work environment. Results from a Structural Equation Model demonstrated that women in STEM face double trouble: The combination of working almost solely with male colleagues (being outnumbered) and working in the technical sector (where women are negatively stereotyped) predicted the highest levels of experienced gender identity threat, particularly among women who highly identified with their gender group. Gender identity threat, in turn, negatively predicted women’s work engagement and career confidence. Men did not face double trouble: Their experience of gender identity threat was not related to working in a masculine STEM sector. Importantly, considering that the women in this sample already hold a degree in STEM, and have proven their competence in STEM and resilience to gender stereotypes, this research reveals how in naturalistic work settings, prevailing social identity threats continue to affect women’s professional careers.

Ribera, Miller, Dumford. In this study we examined the role that high-impact practices play in shaping first-year students' sense of belonging as it relates to peers and institutional acceptance. We used data from the National Survey of Student Engagement (N = 9,371), and results revealed troublesome gaps for historically underrepresented populations in their sense of belonging among their peers and affiliation with the institution. Yet, when students participated in certain high-impact practices (learning communities, service learning, research with faculty, and campus leadership), positive associations were found, even after controlling for other institutional- and student-level characteristics. Implications for first-year programming are discussed.

Puritty, Strickland, et al. Diversity among scientists can foster better science (1, 2), yet engaging and retaining a diversity of students and researchers in science has been difficult (3). Actions that promote diversity are well defined (4), organizations are increasingly focused on diversity (5), and many institutions are developing initiatives to recruit and enroll students from underrepresented minority (URM) groups (racial, ethnic, gender, sexual identity, or persons with disabilities). Yet representation of URM groups in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields lag behind demographics in society at large (3–5), and many URM students feel unwelcome in academic departments and in scientific fields. Why is progress so limited (6, 7)? We see a widespread and under-acknowledged disconnect between initiatives aimed at increasing diversity in academic and professional institutions and the experience of URM students (including many of us authors) (6, 7). We argue that failure to grasp foundations of this disconnect is the crux of why diversity initiatives fail to reach the students that they were made to recruit. We believe that addressing this will resonate with other individuals and groups and help advance discussion in the scientific community.

Harrison, Tanner. Language matters and can have profound effects on individuals’ sense of belonging, self-efficacy, and science identity. This article explores identifying and addressing microaggressions in the everyday language of scientific environments that may be key to making science classrooms, laboratories, and conferences inclusive professional contexts.