"We Actually Have Girls Coding": Co-Authoring Positional Identities of Engineering in Robotics Team Practice

• In Event: Examining Factors in the Development of Science Capital and Identity

Abstract

In this paper, we examine video data of a high school robotics team to explore the space-making practices that empower youth from underrepresented groups in engineering to disrupt traditional boundaries around what engineering is and who is considered competent to participate in its practice. We analyze the in-the-moment positioning work of Turing Robotics (a pseudonym), a high school robotics team, to understand how positional identities (Holland, et al., 1998) are authored into the learning space and negotiated as part of disciplinary practices. We focus on the positioning of two young women of color who take on the programming roles as an important partnership that resists the historical and cultural narratives about who can lead programming challenges for the team.

Authors

• Nyissia Spruill, New York University

• Colin Hennessy Elliott, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Daniela Della Volpe, New York University