Engineering

This study is focused on engineering for sustainable communities (EfSC) in three middle school classrooms. Three in‐depth case studies are presented that explore how two related EfSC epistemic toolsets—(a) community engineering and ethnography tools for defining problems, and (b) integrating perspectives in design specification and optimization through iterative design sketch‐up and prototyping—work to support the following: (a) Students' recruitment of multiple epistemologies; (b) Navigation of multiple epistemologies; and (c) students' onto‐epistemological developments in engineering.

Opportunities to learn in consequential ways are shaped by the historicized injustices students encounter in relation to participation in STEM and schooling. In this article, it is argued that the construct of rightful presence, and the coconstructed “making present” practices that give rise to moments of rightful presence, is 1 way to consider how to make sense of the historicized and relational nature of consequential learning.

Much of the research in science education that explores the influence of a racial and gendered identity on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) engagement for Black women situate their identities primarily as responses to the oppression and struggles they face in STEM. In this study, we use Phenomenological Variant Ecological Systems Theory as a strengths‐based approach to investigate 10 undergraduate Black women’s perceptions of race and gender on their STEM identity development and engagement.