Wage Disparities in Academia for Engineering Women of Color and the Limitations of Advocacy and Agency
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21751985 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Ebony O Mcgee (0000-0002-0499-2620, Johns Hopkins University, corresponding author), Monica Cox (0000-0001-9803-4740, American Society For Engineering Education), Jonathon Main (0000-0002-3984-533X, Purdue University West Lafayette), Monica L Miles (0000-0003-0006-1842), Meseret F Hailu (0000-0001-6080-0577, Arizona State University) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 65 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 914-942 |
| Publication date | 2024-08-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Research in Higher Education (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1573-188X • E-ISSN: 0361-0365 |
| Publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1007/s11162-023-09766-3 |
| OpenAlex | W4390541150 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 55 |
The devaluation of women of Color (WoC) by way of gender discrimination and systemic racism is well documented. For WoC in engineering a chief cause is the observable wage gap. Women who identify as Asian, Black/African American, Latina/Chicana, Indigenous/Native American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, Native Alaskan, and/or multiracial have reported stark wage disparities. In this paper, we offer a phenomenological study of how WoC engineering faculty across U.S. academic institutions describe the challenges and practices associated with wage disparities and how they navigate these disparities. This study, which is based on participant interviews, is guided by three research questions: (1) What do WoC engineering tenure-track faculty perceive about wage disparities based on their race and gender? (2) How do WoC faculty understand the institutional practices that contribute to wage disparities? and (3) How do WoC engineering faculty respond to and address wage disparities? Using structural racism and intersectionality as our guiding conceptual framework, we interviewed 32 self-identified WoC who identified structures and systems of institutional racism related to the maintenance of wage disparities. In terms of findings, we note that WoC have two primary strategies to respond to wage disparity: advocacy and agency. The experiences of WoC engineering faculty in our study highlight unsatisfying institutional responses, and thus WoC often rely on their own agency to advocate for themselves and to advocate for and mentor other WoC faculty. We found a few notable cases where men advocated for women to help close the wage gap. Our work reveals that pay inequity for WoC is often coupled with other forms of exclusion and marginalization. Reducing wage disparities in academia is critical to advancing diversity efforts and ensuring equitable support for WoC faculty. Our findings suggest that institutions can work diligently to rectify wage inequality, including making sustainable structural and salary modifications and sharing the burden of combatting wage inequities. Finally, our findings also highlight the importance of making policy changes to reduce pay inequalities, such as providing transparent pay information and more opportunities to earn merit raises
Demographic economics · Economics · Intersectionality · Labour economics · Political science · Racism · Social science · Sociology · Wage · Gender Diversity and Inequality · Gender Studies · Higher Education Research Studies · Mentoring and Academic Development
Educational foundations
The Origin of Others
Phenomenological research methods
How phenomenology can help us learn from the experiences of others
Counterspaces for women of color in STEM higher education
What Structural Racism Is (or Is Not) and How to Measure It
Development and Validation of the Workplace Climate and Persistence Scale for STEM Faculty Framed in Intersectionality of Gender, Race/Ethnicity, and Socioeconomic Background
Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex
Gender Disparity in STEM Disciplines
Equal but Inequitable
Racial Formation in the United States
How women of colour engineering faculty respond to wage disparities
Innovation Policy, Structural Inequality, and Covid-19
Career–life balance for women of color
Trends in the underrepresentation of women of color faculty in engineering (2005–2018)
The Black Professoriate
Working in unprecedented times
Who Can Lean In? The Intersecting Role of Race and Gender in Negotiations
Pathways to gender inequality in faculty pay
Representation and Salary Gaps by Race-Ethnicity and Gender at Selective Public Universities
Fifteenth Annual Aera Brown Lecture in Education Research
Barriers to the advancement of women of color faculty in STEM
Rethinking Racism
We Want Black Students, Just Not You
Gender Inequality and Time Allocations Among Academic Faculty
Race, Gender, and the Wage Gap
The Intersection of Gender and Race in the Labor Market
Women of Color in the Academy
Structural Racism and Health Inequities
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1 |
| Citation span | 2025 - 2025 (1) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 1 |