How can engineering education be a path to recruiting a more socially diverse student population? Building on data from surveys of bachelor engineering students at a Norwegian technical university over 3 years, this study examines their motivations for studying engineering, separated by parent's educational background to see if we can discern differences in the motivation for engineering students with parents without higher education, that can point to ways of recruiting a more socially diverse student population. The data suggests that references to previous vocational education and/or work in industry are highly overrepresented in working-class students. This suggests that the (not so straightforward) path from vocational education to higher education is particularly important for this student group. Updated with minor typographical corrections: June 30, 2025.
STEM education research has repeatedly demonstrated how the STEM field is gendered masculine. But what does this mean? Is there anything about STEM subjects as such, that warrants labelling them masculine? This paper explores these questions through a meta-narrative, theoretical-critical review of previous review studies. The aim is to investigate how STEM subjects have been conceptualized as gendered in STEM education research, and what this means for feminist STEM educators who want to pluralize STEM education. Three ways of conceptualizing STEM subjects as gendered are identified: 1) The non-substantial association thesis; 2) The masculine epistemology of STEM; 3) STEM as difficult, asocial, and unhelpful. An over-arching finding is that most studies do not explore how STEM subjects emerge as gendered in the educational settings explored. Instead, gender is “imputed” into the analysis in ways that are not always productive for educators who want to pluralize STEM education through educational measures. Updated with minor typographical corrections: June 30, 2025.
The murder of George Floyd catalyzed global awareness of systemic racism and reignited calls for diversity and inclusivity, including in engineering. It highlighted how the legacies of slavery and colonialism persist through neoliberalism and racial capitalism. However, this momentum has waned, with backlash threatening the rollback of critical equity efforts. Superficial inclusivity initiatives are insufficient, but abandoning them entirely risks perpetuating historical and ongoing harms. Current approaches to fostering awareness of colonial impacts, particularly in engineering, inadequately prepare students to meaningfully engage with systemic inequities. We present First Thrive, Then Lead, a transformative framework for engineering education emphasizing mental health and well-being—for educators and students—as foundational to decolonization. This approach addresses how colonial legacies manifest in engineering and critiques dominant paradigms, such as socio-technical dualism, meritocracy, and depoliticization, which hinder meaningful engagement with systemic inequities. Through classroom and extracurricular applications, we demonstrate the potential of First Thrive, Then Lead to foster leadership rooted in empathy, systemic awareness, and transformational change. We call on the engineering community to confront its complicity in structural inequities and adopt practices that prioritize collective healing and justice, essential for the future of engineering education. Updated with minor typographical corrections: June 30, 2025.
This special issue of the International Journal of Engineering, Social Justice, and Peace (IJESJP) represents a wide array of work that was presented, discussed and created during the 2024 Engineering, Social Justice and Peace (ESJP) conference, held at Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg Sweden, and online. In this editorial we say something about the collaborative and creative process behind the conference, the process of interactive peer reviewing employed, and the contributions included in this special issue. Updated with minor typographical corrections: June 30, 2025.
This paper explores how Africanfuturism, specifically Nnedi Okorafor’s Binti series, offers a transformative framework for reimagining engineering education to promote inclusivity, belonging, and diverse epistemologies. Grounded in Marcus Garvey’s call to honor cultural histories, we critique the colonial legacies of engineering, which favor Western knowledge systems while sidelining non-Western contributions. Drawing from bell hooks’ concept of transformative education, we argue that Africanfuturism challenges exclusionary practices by incorporating ancestral knowledge, cultural traditions, and liberatory visions into STEMM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine) fields. Through thematic analyses of race and prejudice, innovation rooted in tradition, and cultural identity, Binti illustrates how Black epistemologies—grounded in community, spirituality, and historical consciousness—can reshape engineering education. We emphasize the potential of Africanfuturist narratives to decenter whiteness, confront systemic racism, and foster educational environments where marginalized students can thrive. By centering Black radical imagination, this paper advocates for an interdisciplinary, justice-oriented approach that integrates storytelling, cultural identity, and diverse ways of knowing to cultivate engineers committed to equity, empathy, and social transformation. Updated with minor typographical corrections: June 30, 2025.
