Figure 1
Model of Inequitable Task Allocation in Project-Based Learning.
Table 1
Demographic Characteristics of Focal Teams.
| RACE/ETHNICITY | SEX | |
|---|---|---|
| Team Mobula | ||
| Matt | White | Male |
| Chelsea | White | Female |
| Max | Asian | Male |
| Addy | Black | Female |
| Kevin | Asian | Male |
| Team Surge | ||
| Danish | Asian | Male |
| Lauren | White | Female |
| Stephanie | White | Female |
| Ryan | White | Male |
| Rehman | Asian | Male |
| The Yachtsmen | ||
| Kyle | White | Male |
| Paul | White | Male |
| John | White | Male |
| Seth | White | Male |
| Cam | White | Male |
[i] Note: All names, including team names, are pseudonyms adopted after data collection.
Table 2
Example Codes and Definitions.
| PARENT CODE | CHILD CODE | DEFINITION | EXAMPLE |
|---|---|---|---|
| Action Opportunity | Action Opportunity for Design | A student takes or is granted an opportunity to contribute to design tasks (e.g., presenting ideas, developing CAD model) | [Student Interview]: I just started to do more. I felt like I was actually contributing, especially once I got started on the CAD model… |
| Action Opportunity for Building | A student is takes or is granted the opportunity to contribute to building tasks for the team. | [Peer Mentor Journal]: [Student A] is a bit quieter, so I didn’t see her contributing idea-wise as much during build sessions, but [Student B] definitely took a bit more of a leading role in actually physically building the ROV. | |
| Action Opportunity for Technical Communication | Student takes or is granted an opportunity to contribute to technical communications tasks (e.g., report writing, developing presentations). | [Peer Mentor Journal]: [Student] really stepped up in making sure that the reports were done on time and getting people to plan when they were going to meet and who was working on what. | |
| Background Characteristics | Salience of Gender | Student discusses the salience of gender in engineering or engineering design. | [Peer Mentor Journal]: The girls in the group had a lot of great ideas however at times I had to encourage them to keep expressing them especially after rather tense moments when ideas where discarded. |
| Engineering Background | Student discusses engineering-related background experiences. | [Student Interview]: I took two years of CS in high school. I feel no confidence in my CS skills. | |
| Lack of Skills/Experience | A student discusses the role inexperience played in their individual or team design process. | [Student Interview]: Well, I guess I feel like for a student that doesn’t have a ton of experience, it’s all just stuff that you might just see in passing. | |
| Affective Elements | Confidence | A student discusses the degree to which they are confident taking on design, build, or communicate tasks. | [Student Interview]: Definitely grown in those areas, but definitely not confident enough to do a lot of it by myself. |
| Task Delegation | Task Delegation | A student discusses the ways in which tasks were delegated on their team. | [Student Interview]: The roles kind of came naturally, I guess, when delegating. |
| Task Delegation Equity | A student discusses their perceptions about whether task delegation was equitable in their team. | [Fieldnotes]: As they start to build the vessel, the team seems intent on ensuring that every gets equal opportunities to work on the building. They worked out the total number of cuts necessary to build the concept vessel and divide the total equally amongst them. |
[i] Note: The task delegation and action opportunities codes captured different elements of the design process. Specifics about task delegation (i.e., person X did A and B tasks) were coded as “Action Opportunities”. The task delegation code captured students’ broader discussions about the team’s approach to delegation. Sometimes these two things were discussed at once.
Table 3
Example Synthesis of Fieldnotes, Interview Quotes, and Peer Mentor Journals about the role Prior Experiences and Academic Orientations in Task Delegation.
| EXCERPT FROM FIELDNOTES | RELATED INTERVIEW QUOTES |
|---|---|
| Kyle began the (Re)Introduction exercise, offering that, as a result of his experiences growing up and working with his father, he is “good at putting stuff together.” Kyle said he would like to expand his CAD skills during the project. John followed Kyle by offering that he brings mathematics and programming skills to the project. Like Kyle, John said he would like to expand his CAD knowledge over the course of the project. Paul followed John and discussed his experiences growing up a farm and how they had prepared him for work on the team. “I grew up on a farm, so I’m good at building stuff.” Seth followed by offering that he brought computer science/coding skills to the team. Seth added that he wished to expand his building skills—“my skills in the lab and putting things together.” Cam chimed in that he brought CAD skills to the project, adding that he wished to expand his coding and building knowledge. | Kyle: Because I definitely did want to work on the CAD a little bit more and develop my skills in CAD, because I took CAD in high school like sophomore year, but I haven’t really done much with it since then. |
| John: Whereas I know Seth and Paul, they got almost no experience in that CAD process. My thoughts were not like I want to keep this all for myself. | |
| Seth: I did CAD for those first two labs, and I was not very excited about it. I did not like it very much. It was definitely very frustrating for me all the parts together and I can’t imagine how much of it Cam had to go through doing that, but just the fact that he’d done that before and he seemed like he wanted to do that for the team definitely helped us out a lot. |