First‐generation college students' funds of knowledge support the development of an engineering role identity

Identifying as an engineer is essential for belonging and student success, yet the social context and professional norms make it more difficult for some students to establish an identity as an engineer.


| INTRODUCTION
Learning and identity are inseparable.Lave and Wenger (1991) rightfully acknowledged the connection between learning and identity development, emphasizing that learning is identity in the making.Wenger (2010) further emphasized how learning experiences are fundamental to our practice of gaining competency and "becoming a certain person, a knower in a context" (p.2).Becoming a certain kind of person (e.g., by forming an engineering role identity) is critical in helping college students to sustain motivation and engagement in the process of learning (National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, 2018).Ample studies have documented how an engineering identity supports students' intentions to choose a major in engineering (Godwin & Kirn, 2020), supports persistence beliefs (Jones et al., 2013;Patrick et al., 2018;Verdín, 2021aVerdín, , 2021b)), bolsters confidence in their choice of major (Verdín & Godwin, 2021;Verdín, Godwin, Sonnert, & Sadler, 2018), and helps them pursue an engineering industry-related career (Verdín & Godwin, 2017).More recently, Verdín (2024) found that Latinx students' engineering role identity positively impacted their perceptions of their future career outcomes, which encompassed beliefs about obtaining their desired engineering job and succeeding in their chosen career.Identifying as an engineer also has important implications for students' sense of belonging (Meyers et al., 2012;Tonso, 1999Tonso, , 2007;;Verdín, 2021b).Tonso (2007) further posited that "identities serve as focal points for learning to belong in communities of practice" (p.235).Given its utmost importance to students' persistence and future career outcomes, it is crucial that we understand how an engineering role identity is developed.
Identities are not entirely based on individual manifestations but emerge from "our position and the position of our communities within broader social structures" (Wenger, 2010, p. 148).The engineering community of practice, established under a "system of practices, meanings, and beliefs," influences how students develop their engineering identity (Tonso, 1996, p. 218).Because engineering communities of practice are constituted by norms, students are not entirely free to develop any type of engineering identity.Instead, students are guided by "larger and more pervasive meanings […] derived from sociohistorical legacies" (Carlone & Johnson, 2007, p. 1192) that include racialized and gendered norms, which are especially fraught for minoritized students.For students who do not fit the predominant mold of an engineer, their position within the engineering community is often contested (Pawley, 2012a(Pawley, , 2012b)).As a result, ways of knowing in engineering can differentially enable students to form an engineering identity, depending on how knowledge is selected, organized, bounded, delivered, valued, and evaluated (e.g., Claris & Riley, 2012;Downey, 2015;Riley, 2017).Knowledge and judgments of expertise inflected by gender, race, and socioeconomic class bias have been baked into engineering (Calvert, 1967;Smith Rolston & Cox, 2015;Slaton, 2010) and, subsequently, the dominant engineering identities encountered by students.This historical context helps explain why minoritized students-specifically first-generation college students-describe the culture and content of undergraduate engineering programs as foreign or even hostile (e.g., Foor et al., 2007;Ong et al., 2018;Verdín, 2021a).Hence, it is no accident that first-generation college students find their knowledge and skills absent from or undervalued in the engineering curriculum.
When first-generation college students enroll in engineering programs, they bring with them their histories of learning and ways of participating in the world.Here, we define the specific type of shared history of learning as students' funds of knowledge, that is, the bodies of knowledge acquired through home or community's everyday practices and lived experiences (Gonz alez et al., 2005).Studies have documented that first-generation college students enter engineering programs with accumulated engineering-relevant bodies of knowledge from their experiences at home, including through their participation in communities and through manual or other skilled labor (Smith & Lucena, 2015, 2016).However, the funds of knowledge that first-generation college students bring to higher education are often negotiated because they do not resonate with the dominant engineering practices or identities embedded in the engineering communities of practice.Thus, critically reflecting on what knowledge "counts" as engineering knowledge is important for understanding and better supporting first-generation college student's development of an engineering role identity.
First-generation college students' funds of knowledge should also be considered resources that can be leveraged to help them to identify as engineers.Therefore, in this paper, we propose a relationship between first-generation college students' accumulated bodies of knowledge from home or through work experiences and their formation of an engineering role identity.The engineering role identity development process used throughout this study includes mechanisms of interest, performance/competence beliefs, and external and internal recognition.While students' funds of knowledge are extensive, this paper focuses on seven that have been validated in prior work (Verdín et al., 2021).Our study shows that a funds of knowledge approach can provide a platform for students to incorporate their lived experiences into defining their identities within the engineering context.

| First-generation college students
First-generation college students encompass a complex and diverse group of individuals whose experiences are shaped by multiple intersecting social identities.While the designation of "first-generation college student" can vary across institutions, Whitley et al. (2018) identified that among U.S. institutions with a formal definition, more than half of them used the following classification: "neither parent or guardian hav[ing] a four-year college degree" (p. 7).However, the first-generation college student identity does not exist in isolation.From an intersectional perspective, we recognize that the first-generation college student label intertwines with other core aspects of their lives.Many of these students also come from challenging socioeconomic backgrounds, as indicated by their comparatively high eligibility for programs such as Federal Pell Grants, a need-based financial aid for U.S. higher education students.Furthermore, first-generation college students are often from racially/ethnically diverse backgrounds (i.e., Latinx, Black, etc.;Cahalan et al., 2019;Rieckenberg et al., 2014;Saenz et al., 2007;Snyder et al., 2019;U.S. Department of Education, 2001).While first-generation college students' intersecting identities and lived experiences bring unique strengths and obstacles to their educational journeys (Ives & Castillo-Montoya, 2020), empirical research has found that after controlling for socioeconomic status, age, sex, race/ethnicity, and institution type, the "first-generation status appears to be a disadvantage throughout postsecondary education" when predicting degree attainment (U.S.Department of Education & National Center for Education Statistics, 2001, p. 26).Therefore, our study examines students who, at minimum, identified as first-generation college students.

| PURPOSE
Identities are created, recreated, and sustained through participation in activities or experiences (Brickhouse, 2001;Lave & Wenger, 1991;Ligorio, 2010;Roth & Barton, 2004); included in these experiences should be those obtained from home or throughout one's young adult life.More recently, Esteban-Guitart and Moll (2014) and Esteban-Guitart (2021) argued that the accumulated bodies of knowledge individuals gathered from their home or lived experiences (i.e., funds of knowledge) are reservoirs individuals use to construct their self-definitions.The authors postulated that an individual's funds of knowledge help define one's identity when they are actively leveraged in practice.
Literature, however, has yet to discuss how funds of knowledge are reservoirs that can be appropriated to support the engineering identity development process.This paper investigates if and how first-generation college students' funds of knowledge inform their development of an engineering role identity, especially the crucial dimensions of interest, performance/competence beliefs, and recognition.While performance/competence beliefs are a general view of student's capabilities to perform well in their coursework, it does not elucidate how first-generation college students developed this belief.Prior work has found that first-generation college students' perceptions of being recognized as an engineer by instructors, parents, and peers are informed by performance/competence beliefs (Verdín, 2021b;Verdín et al., 2019;Verdín & Godwin, 2019).However, that relationship is only a partial view of how students come to be recognized as engineers.As well, it remains unclear how their accumulated bodies of knowledge from home and/or work foster their enjoyment in learning engineering (i.e., interest).In this study, we examine whether performance/ competence beliefs, interest, recognition, and students' overall perceptions of themselves as engineers are also cultivated by their funds of knowledge.Specifically, using a sample of first-generation college students who predominantly identified as Latinx, we sought to answer the following research question: RQ: How do first-generation college students' funds of knowledge support the development of an engineering role identity?

| THEORETICAL FRAMEWORKS
We use two theoretical frameworks to guide our analysis, specifically engineering role identity and funds of knowledge.

| Engineering role identity
An individual who takes on an engineering role identity adopts its meanings and expectations "and then act[s] to represent and preserve these meanings and expectations" in interaction with others (Sets & Burke, 2000, p. 227).Through this framing, identity is tied to meanings an individual embraces as a role-holder and the different social positions that a person holds (Stets & Burke, 2003).Therefore, the meaning and expectations associated with an engineering role identity are contextualized to students' life stage, that is, students in postsecondary education instead of those in a professional environment.When students reflect and respond to the statement "I see myself as an engineer," they think about the meanings, expectations, and practices that accompany their new social position as a student in an engineering program.The social position of a student is intimately tied to the role (and expectations) of learning, acquiring new skill sets, studying, passing courses, progressing toward degree completion, and being interested in the topics they are learning.The expectations of a role are learned through interactions with others within the community of practice; through those interactions, students are afforded (or denied) recognition.Importantly, expectations of a role can also be aspirational "goals or outcomes that one should achieve in a role" (Sets & Burke, 2000, p. 114).Specifically, authoring a role identity in the undergraduate engineering context, when considering the social position of the individual, is a process that encompasses the expectations and meanings of (1) being interested in the content, (2) demonstrating competence through performative practices, (3) being externally recognized, and ultimately (4) internalizing the recognition (Carlone & Johnson, 2007;Cribbs et al., 2015;Godwin, 2016;Godwin & Kirn, 2020;Hazari et al., 2010;Verdín, Godwin, & Ross, 2018).We acknowledge that this framing of engineering role identity is distinctly separate from the lens that could be applied to the professional identity of an engineer.
1. Interest in the context plays a key role in framing identity and involves a personal desire for learning and understanding in each context (Hazari et al., 2010).Interest can be understood as a psychological state with affective and cognitive factors focused on particular content and/or an "enduring predisposition to re-engage [with] particular classes of objects, events, or ideas" (Renninger & Hidi, 2002, p. 174; also refer to Ainley et al., 2002;Hidi & Renninger, 2006).Interest is often considered ubiquitous and may even be overlooked, yet it is a crucial expectation associated with students' perceptions of themselves as engineers.Simply put, one cannot see him/herself as an engineer if he or she has no interest in the role and the practices and meanings associated with it.2. For engineering students, some practices and expectations are tied to demonstrating their competence.That is, students are expected to acquire the patterns of behaviors and actions necessary to do engineering-related work-for example, application of math, science, design process, and other technical concepts, to name a few-and perform their competence in their coursework or internships.Carlone and Johnson (2007) initially theorized that students are recognized as a certain kind of persons when they make visible their ability to perform well and understand the course material in particular domains, thus signaling the important role performance abilities have in how (if at all) students become recognized as engineers.3. External recognition is both an external manifestation and an internal state required for identity development (Burke & Stets, 2009;Carlone & Johnson, 2007;Gee, 2001;Potvin & Hazari, 2013).Stets and Burke's (2003) approach to understanding role identity through a structural symbolic interactionist perspective asserts that "persons who act in the context of social structures name one another in the sense of recognizing one another as occupants of positions [e.g., an instructor recognizing a student] and come to have expectations of those others" (p.130).This conceptualization of role identity sits in tandem with identity in the education literature (e.g., Gee, 2001).Gee's (2001) approach to understanding identity also emphasized the importance of individuals "acting and interacting in a given context" and the interchange of "being recognized as a certain 'kind of person'" based on one's performance (p.99). 4.However, being externally recognized as an engineer is still an incomplete representation of students' perceptions of themselves (Gee, 2001).It is equally important that students internalize the recognition, as it also shapes how they position themselves in the engineering community of practice (Godwin et al., 2016;Potvin & Hazari, 2013).Thus, internalized recognition, for example, seeing oneself as an engineer, is necessary in developing an identity.
In isolation, these four elements are not enough to inform how engineering students come to define themselves as engineers, but combined, they form a process that helps students to internalize the role identity of an engineer.

| Funds of knowledge in higher education
The funds of knowledge framework acknowledges the rich experiences, resources, and bodies of knowledge economically disadvantaged families possess as a result of their daily activities (Gonz alez et al., 2005;Marquez Kiyama & Rios-Aguilar, 2017;Moll et al., 1992).Framing students' lived experiences as rich with funds of knowledge rejects the notion that students' households can be reduced to being economically poor and poor in terms of quality of experiences (Moll et al., 1992).The framework emphasizes the importance of a family's knowledge, social networks, and resourcefulness as sources of learning for students (Gonz alez et al., 2005).Mejia and Wilson-Lopez (2016) captured how Latinx adolescents leveraged their engineering-related funds of knowledge to create a solution for a design project or problems faced in their everyday lives.
The original conceptualization of the funds of knowledge framework focused too heavily on the perspectives and practices of adults in students' lives.However, Oughton (2010) acknowledged a shift in how we think about funds of knowledge, drawing attention to viewing cultural and cognitive resources as not only "possessed by households or communities to those possessed by individuals" (p.67, original emphasis).Within higher education, scholars also pushed for greater acknowledgment that adult students have their own accumulated funds of knowledge, distinct from those of their families of origin (Marquez Kiyama & Rios-Aguilar, 2017).Early critiques of the funds of knowledge framework included using a single methodological approach (e.g., ethnography) and its focus on K-12 students only, with an overemphasis on merely recognizing that students have funds of knowledge (Rios-Aguilar et al., 2011).There have been concerted efforts toward moving beyond simply recognizing that students have funds of knowledge toward a conversation about how their bodies of knowledge are converted into forms of capital (Marquez Kiyama & Rios-Aguilar, 2017;Rios-Aguilar et al., 2011).Shifting the focus to understanding how students convert their funds of knowledge into capital aims to disrupt the deficit discourse found in the cultural capital theory and "challenges power structures that reproduce educational inequalities" (Marquez Kiyama & Rios-Aguilar, 2017, p. 35).This perspective calls attention to the relationships of power within which engineering students live, including the curriculum, classroom settings, and engineering culture.
Funds of knowledge and cultural capital can be transmitted between generations, accumulated, and converted (Kiyama, 2010;Oughton, 2010).Both are characterized by "sets of gradually acquired and long-lasting dispositions […] manifested in skills, know-hows, and competencies" (Oughton, 2010, p. 69).The work of engineering studies scholars has emphasized how cultural and social capital has played a significant role in the organization, legitimation, dissemination, and use of engineering knowledge around the world since the creation of engineering schools (Downey & Lucena, 2005;Layton, 1986;Lucena, 2007;Lucena, 2009).Thus, a funds of knowledge approach presses against dominant hegemonic notions of social and cultural capital by asserting working class families' social and cultural capital.Recognizing how first-generation college students' funds of knowledge can be converted into forms of capital to support their engineering role identity development is a premise for positioning their lived experiences as equally valuable knowledge in engineering.Positioning first-generation college students' lived experiences as valuable knowledge in engineering is therefore necessary to convert funds of knowledge into capital.Our research expands on this scholarship by investigating the link between students' funds of knowledge and the development of an engineering role identity.

| METHODS
Data for this study came from students enrolled in nine different four-year ABET-accredited institutions in the United States West, South, and Mountain regions in the fall semester of 2018.We used purposeful and snowball sampling to collect our data.We leveraged our social networks and deliberately sought out institutions that could increase our sample of first-generation college students.Five participating institutions had engineering student support programs that supported racially/ethnically minoritized, low-income, and first-generation college students; these were Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI).The other institutions were selected because of their geographic diversity, particularly targeting rural regions.
This study focused exclusively on students who indicated that their parents' level of education was either "less than a high school diploma," "high school diploma/GED," or "some college or associate/trade degree."The sample of students who indicated their parents had less than a bachelor's degree (i.e., first-generation college students) comprised n = 378.Those who reported having at least one parent who completed a "bachelor's degree" or "master's degree or higher" were removed from the analysis.The distribution of first-generation college students who responded to our survey ranged from 125 (15%) first year, 157 (19%) second year, 205 (25%) third year, and 332 (41%) fourth year or higher.Additional demographic information of the sample is shown in Table 1.No student selected a gender different from female or male, even though multiple options were presented.
All analyses were conducted using R software (R Core Team, 2021).Data used in this study are cross-sectional.

| Engineering role identity
Prior work has established strong and valid evidence for the engineering role identity measures used in this analysis, that is, interest, performance/competence, and external/internal recognition (Godwin, 2016;Verdín et al., 2019).Internal consistency measured using Cronbach's alpha for the engineering role identity latent constructs was between .78 and .88,which is considered within the acceptable range (Cronbach, 1951).Students were evaluated on their level of agreement using a 7-point Likert scale ranging from 0 (strongly disagree) to 6 (strongly agree).

| Funds of knowledge
The seven funds of knowledge constructs used in this study were created using ethnographic data of first-generation college students.Validity evidence was obtained using a sample with a high representation of such students (i.e., 46%; Verdín et al., 2021).Table 2 describes each fund-of-knowledge construct, with the understanding that these constructs are not an exhaustive representation of students' various funds of knowledge but a categorization of major themes salient to a group of first-generation college students.For the survey items associated with the network from family, college friends, and coworkers/mentors, students were asked to indicate to what extent the statements were true using a 7-point anchored numeric Likert scale ranging from 0 (not at all true) to 6 (very true).Students were asked to rate their Students were allowed to select multiple choices for race/ethnicity.We acknowledge that some scholars treat race and ethnicity as separate categories; here we group them to draw attention to the racialized experiences faced by members of certain ethnic groups.
b Pell Grants are awarded to students who demonstrate exceptional financial need; financial need is determined upon completion of a Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).
level of agreement using a 7-point anchored numeric Likert scale ranging from 0 (strongly disagree) to 6 (strongly agree) for items associated with connecting experiences and tinkering knowledge from home.Students were prompted with the question "How accurately do the following describe you?" for items associated with perspective-taking and mediational skills.They responded using a 7-point anchored numeric Likert scale ranging from 0 (very inaccurately) to 6 (very accurately).All Cronbach's alpha values were within acceptable ranges between .80 and .88.

| Data analysis
Our data analysis comprised of four steps: (1) examining the assumptions of univariate and multivariate normality; (2) examining the measurement model using a confirmatory factor analysis; (3) testing all possible regression paths (i.e., relationships); and (4) examining measurement invariance to determine equality of men and women engineering students.The confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation model were conducted using the lavaan package for R software (Rosseel, 2012).

| Assumptions of normality
The analytical method requires that we examine assumptions of univariate and multivariate normality.Skewness and kurtosis were examined, and measures were within acceptable ranges; that is, skewness did not exceed ±2 and kurtosis did not exceed ±7 (Curran et al., 1996); exact values can be found in Appendix A. Multivariate normality using Mardia's test showed that our data was not multivariate-normal (multivariate skewness value = 141.34,p < .001;kurtosis value = 986.58,p < .001).However, Micceri's (1989) work evaluating real-world psychometric distributions found that non-normality is common.Given the outcome of the multivariate normality test, we conducted a Satorra-Bentler (SBχ 2 ) mean-adjusted test statistic to account for non-normality in the distribution (Satorra & Bentler, 2010).Additionally, a robust maximum likelihood estimator was used to correct the model Chi-square and the standard errors of the parameter estimates for deviations from a normal distribution (Brown, 2015;Satorra & Bentler, 2001).

| Measurement model
The measurement model's SB-adjusted Chi-square test for goodness of fit was SBχ 2 = 852.37,df = 505, p <.001.It is common for measurement models to output a significant SBχ 2 goodness of fit, as Chi-square tests tend to be sensitive to large sample sizes (Lomax & Schumacker, 2004).The fit indices for the final model suggest an overall good model fit T A B L E 2 Funds of knowledge constructs in this study (Verdín et al., 2021).

Funds of knowledge Definition
Tinkering with CFI = 0.95, TLI = 0.94, RMSEA = 0.040 with a 90% confidence interval of 0.036-0.045,and an SRMR = 0.048.The comparative fit index (CFI) and the Tucker-Lewis index (TLI) are within the recommended range of 0.90-0.95(Brown, 2015;Hooper et al., 2008;Kline, 2016).Scholars recommend a root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) value of less than 0.05, with the upper confidence interval not exceeding 0.080 (Brown, 2015;Hu & Bentler, 1999;Maccallum et al., 1996;West et al., 2012).Brown (2015) adds that additional support to a good model fit solution is evidenced in the upper limit of a 90% confidence interval that does not exceed 0.08 cutoff value.An SRMR value no greater than 0.80 indicates a reasonable model fit (Brown, 2015;Hu & Bentler, 1999); our SRMR value is well below the reasonable fit metric.These fit indices are used to assess how well the model adequately explains the relationships between the variables under study.Because all the fit indices are within acceptable ranges, we conclude that our model is a good fit to the data.
In addition, the following model parameters and factor reliability values were evaluated and found to be within acceptable ranges: factor loadings, indicator reliability, variance, and construct reliability.All standardized factor loadings were well above 0.45, as recommended by Tabachnick and Fidell (2013).Indicator reliability, evaluated by individually squaring the standardized factor loadings, were above 0.50, demonstrating that each item measured above 50% of the true-score variance (Brown, 2015).The amount of variance captured by each latent construct was greater in relation to the amount of variance due to measurement error, that is, the variance was above .50(Fornell & Larcker, 1981).The construct reliability, evaluated using Cronbach's alpha, was between .80 and .89,which is above the recommended alpha value of .70 and indicating good construct reliability (Tavakol & Dennick, 2011).Table 3 summarizes the model parameter estimates and factor reliability estimates.Overall, these model parameters and factor reliability values provide evidence for validity of the constructs.

| Structural model fit
This study is the first to model the relationships between funds of knowledge and engineering identity; therefore, we cannot solely rely on the literature to help guide the model.We took an exploratory approach to testing regression paths.All possible paths were tested, and their p-values were evaluated.Relationships with high p-values were removed one at a time.This process was iterative, and we stopped when all regression paths had a p-value of ≤.05, leading us to the most parsimonious model.
The final structural model fit had an SBχ 2 (test for goodness of fit) = 6651.87,df = 630, and p < .001.The fit indices were CFI = 0.95, TLI = 0.94, RMSEA = 0.044 with a 90% confidence interval of 0.038-0.049,and an SRMR = 0.051.Overall, the fit indices suggest good overall model fit (Hooper et al., 2008;Kline, 2016).The final model is shown in Figure 1, with all non-significant paths removed, as a simpler model is preferred (Kline, 2016).A summary of the nonsignificant paths that were tested and later removed can be found in Appendix B.

| Measurement invariance
After establishing an acceptable model fit, a measurement invariance test was conducted to determine whether women and men similarly conceptualized the constructs of engineering role identity and the seven funds of knowledge constructs.Table 4 summarizes the three levels of measurement invariance we tested: configural (Model 1), metric (Model 2), scalar (Model 3), and strict invariance (Model 4) using a Chi-square difference test.Model 1 examines whether the number of factors and factor patterns are identical across women and men.Model 2 examines whether women and men attributed similar meanings across each latent construct.Model 3 examines how students use the survey Likert scale, specifically investigating whether "one group systematically [gave] higher or lower responses than another group" (Cheung & Rensvold, 2000, p. 190).Lastly, Model 4 examines whether the measures reflect true differences rather than random error.A more comprehensive discussion of measurement invariance can be found in Brown (2015), Kline (2016), and Sass and Schmitt (2013).Because the model is equivalent across women and men, the discussion of our results should be focused on the broader group of first-generation college students rather than distinguished by gender.

| RESULTS
This study builds on prior research by investigating how first-generation college students' funds of knowledge may inform the process of developing an engineering role identity.These funds of knowledge are a collection of interpersonal skills (i.e., perspective-taking and mediational skills), practices and skillsets acquired from home (i.e., tinkering knowledge from home and connecting experiences), and the strategic use of community resources from family members, coworkers/mentors, and college friends.Findings from our model point to seven funds of knowledge that help inform first-generation college students' engineering role identity development.

| Engineering role identity development process
The engineering role identity development process has been previously modeled with a sample of White, male engineering students (Godwin & Kirn, 2020), and the same framework was used with first-generation college students in engineering programs (Boone & Kirn, 2016;Verdín et al., 2019).The findings presented in this section corroborate the relationships observed in prior work with first-generation college students, albeit with a sample of predominantly Latinx students, specifically confirming that interest in engineering and external recognition are directly related to these students' views of themselves as engineers ("I see myself as an engineer"; β = 0.46, p < .001and β = 0.41, p < .001,respectively).No direct relationship was found between first-generation college students' performance/competence beliefs and their views of themselves as engineers, thus supporting prior work.Instead, students' beliefs about their performance/competence indirectly supported their engineering role identity via interest and recognition (β = 0.64, p < .001and β = 0.51, p < .001,respectively).That is, beliefs about one's performance abilities were not enough to foster their engineering role identity development: students must attach meaning to their engagement by being interested in the subject area and have their bids for recognition externally validated.

| Funds of knowledge that support students' views of themselves as engineers
We found only one fund of knowledge that had a direct and positive relationship to first-generation college students' perceptions of themselves as engineers: network from family members (β = 0.11, p < .05).Conversely, the resources and advice students receive from individuals whom they consider mentors or coworkers had a negative relationship toward students' perceptions of themselves as engineers (β = À0.15,p < .001).
F I G U R E 1 Summary of the relationship between first-generation college students' funds of knowledge and engineering identity development.Only significant paths were retained in the model.Estimates appear in standardized form.
T A B L E 4 Summary of measurement invariance of latent constructs used in the model.

| Funds of knowledge that support performance/competence beliefs
Our findings point to three funds of knowledge that help build on students' existing beliefs about their performance/ competence abilities.Specifically, first-generation college students' interpersonal skill of perspective-taking was found to support performance/competence beliefs (β = 0.12, p < .05).Tinkering knowledge from home also positively supported first-generation college students' performance/competence beliefs (β = 0.15, p < .05).Our model also suggests that when first-generation college students capitalize on the knowledge attained from their home or hobby activities to support their learning (our construct of connecting experiences), this promotes positive beliefs about their performance capabilities (β = 0.36, p < .001).Moreover, connecting one's experiences from home or hobbies to one's engineering learning (i.e., connecting experiences) was twice as important to students' performance/competence beliefs compared to the other funds of knowledge.

| Funds of knowledge that support students' engineering interest
We found three funds of knowledge that had a positive influence on first-generation college students' engineering interest: tinkering knowledge from home (β = 0.14, p < .05),perspective-taking (β = 0.13, p < .05),and accessing coworkers/mentors networks (β = 0.10, p < .05).However, one fund of knowledge had a negative influence on interest: accessing family networks (β = À0.18,p < .01).The negative relationship suggests that the more the students' family network provides resources and advice to help them with their engineering coursework, the less interested they become in engineering-even though this same fund of knowledge supported an internalized recognition as an engineer, as discussed above.There was, however, a significant positive correlation between networks from family members and tinkering knowledge from home, which is a fund of knowledge that supports their performance/competence beliefs.Thus, family networks seem to positively influence first-generation college students' identity development, albeit through different routes.

| Funds of knowledge that support students' external recognition
First-generation college students' bids for recognition can be realized through the application of their mediational skills (β = 0.13, p < .05).The advice, resources, and even emotional support college friends provide to first-generation college students to help them progress through their engineering coursework also afforded them positive recognition as engineers (β = 0.20, p < .000).Lastly, students' ability to see connections between their home experiences and capitalize on these experiences to scaffold their learning not only supports how they perceive their performance abilities but also affords them positive recognition as engineers by their instructors, peers, and parents (β = 0.16, p < .000).

| LIMITATIONS
This study has some limitations.Our data were collected at only one point in time.Therefore, we cannot determine how first-generation college students' funds of knowledge continue to evolve through work-related experiences or athome experiences.Our funds-of-knowledge survey scale captured a limited number of bodies of knowledge that one group of participants accumulated throughout their lives.We acknowledge that there is an array of knowledge that could help explain engineering identity development and persistence that could not be modeled with our survey scale.Expanding our current instrument would be a fertile area for future research.Identities are dynamic, malleable, and constantly being (re)shaped through experiences.Our study captured past experiences that support identity development, but a longitudinal qualitative study would be ideal to shed light on how students continued to use their funds of knowledge to shape their identities as engineers.Lastly, there is skepticism about using single-item measures (e.g., "I see myself as an engineer").This is due to the limitations surrounding single-item measures, including the inability to compute an internal reliability score, susceptibility to unrecognized interpretation biases, and potential exposure to measurement errors (Hoeppner et al., 2011).Yet, despite these acknowledged shortcomings, a number of studies employing diverse survey scales have shown that single-item measures can yield satisfactory or comparable results as compared with multi-item measures (refer to Bergkvist & Rossiter, 2007;Drolet & Morrison, 2001;Gardner et al., 1998;Hoeppner et al., 2011).

| Engineering role identity: Evaluating the importance of interest and recognition
Our findings confirm the importance of fostering first-generation college students' interest in engineering and validating their bids for recognition, as these equally influence their identity formation.A unique finding from our model is that external recognition and interest have a comparable impact on first-generation college students' engineering role identity (i.e., "I see myself as an engineer") when comparing the β-values.Our present finding contrasts with those of prior work, suggesting that receiving external recognition is the most influential source for engineering identity development (e.g., Godwin & Kirn, 2020).Many previous studies that used this framing of identity in a science, math, and engineering context (e.g., Cribbs et al., 2015;Godwin et al., 2016;Godwin & Kirn, 2020) were based on samples that overrepresented White males.Similarly, in a study of first-generation college students that over-represented White males, Verdín and Godwin (2019) also found that recognition had the highest influence on their engineering role identity.These prior studies suggest that recognition may play a key role in bolstering engineering role identity because White males' bids for recognition might be more easily validated and conferred.The present study included more participants whose experiences in higher education and the broader society have been racialized, that is, Latinx students (refer to Yosso & Sol orzano, 2005).Taken together, this body of research underscores that the process of being recognized as an engineer is racialized.This conclusion was also arrived at over a decade ago by Carlone and Johnson: "[B]lack and American Indian women in this study reported experiences where their recognition as science people w[ere] disrupted also suggests that processes of recognition within science institutions may be more shaped by race and ethnicity than we would like to admit" (Carlone & Johnson, 2007, p. 1207).Considering that students are embedded in an engineering community of practice, they enact roles they believe will support their membership within that community of practice, but unfortunately, that can conflict with how they want to exist as aspiring engineers.The process of receiving recognition can reproduce historical and prototypical depictions of engineers.Unless fundamental change occurs that redefines what it means to be an engineer, recognition will be more readily conferred on to those whose lived experiences, ways of talking, looking, and acting align with the discipline.Therefore, it is vital to understand how to validate Latinx, first-generation college students' bids for recognition equitably.This study points to three funds of knowledge that can validate students' bids for recognition: mediational skills, connecting experiences, and networks from college friends.
Our study also points to the salience of interest in developing an engineering role identity.Interest has received less attention than external recognition and performance/competence beliefs, perhaps due to its absence in Carlone and Johnson's (2007) original identity model and Gee's (2001) focus on recognition.While Carlone and Johnson (2007) stated, "developing a satisfactory science identity hinges not only upon having competence and interest in science" (p.1197), their focus seemed to be more on how women's bids for recognition were validated or disrupted.By focusing on the influential role that others play in students' identity development through recognition, the authors downplayed the powerful influence interest had on identity development.In their discussion, however, they did acknowledge how interest had a pervasive undertone among the participants, stating, "the women in this study did not need any support for their interest in science; on the contrary, in some cases, they steadfastly maintained that interest despite the discouragement they received" (p.1209).Our goal is not to criticize Carlone and Johnson's (2007) identity model but to underline the importance of interest.Although interest may be thought of as a ubiquitous component of an individual's pursuit of an engineering degree, Verdín's (2021aVerdín's ( , 2021b) study found that minoritized women's interest in engineering was the strongest predictor of their persistence beliefs, which parallels with Patrick et al.'s (2018) findings.

| Tinkering knowledge from home
Tinkering knowledge from home relates to activities (i.e., repairing, assembling, or building) that students have engaged with at home, making it a practical fund of knowledge borne out of the family's need to be resourceful amidst economic necessity (Verdín et al., 2021).The present study shows that this fund of knowledge supports the engineering identity development process.Specifically, students' home tinkering knowledge supported their interest in engineering and perception of their abilities to perform well and understand engineering course material.This finding builds on our previous research, which demonstrated that this fund of knowledge directly supported first-generation college students' certainty of graduating (Verdin et al., 2020).Our previous study also found that tinkering knowledge supported their beliefs about doing well in engineering coursework, which in turn helped their certainty of majoring in engineering (Verdin et al., 2020).We suspect that tinkering knowledge may be especially powerful for first-generation college students because it is a fund of knowledge that is increasingly validated externally by many engineering disciplines, from the public celebration of "tinkerers" such as Thomas Edison and Steve Jobs to the makerspace movement.We note, however, that this relationship is not straightforward, as the scientization of U.S. engineering education devalued manual labor (Smith Rolston & Cox, 2015), and some makerspaces were found to reinforce the privileges of White, male, able-bodied, and economically privileged students (Foster, 2017;Ottemo et al., 2023;Schauer et al., 2023;Stark Masters, 2018).Engineering educators must critically reflect on how a scientized curriculum and the accreditation criteria that legitimize it are biased against a particular form of tinkering.Even though the practice of tinkering is recognized as highly important for innovation in engineering (Baker & Krause, 2007;Bettiol et al., 2014), it is important to create spaces that celebrate first-generation college students' tinkering knowledge and abilities in engineering courses without reinforcing stereotypes.

| Interpersonal skills of perspective-taking and mediational skills
While the original funds of knowledge framework emphasized practical knowledge (e.g., tinkering abilities), our research emphasizes the significance of interpersonal skills.Our prior work identified perspective-taking and mediational skills as important funds of knowledge that first-generation college students capitalized on in their engineering internships (Verdín et al., 2021).Perspective-taking is the capacity to examine a situation from another person's experience, and mediational skills are understood as students' ability to help others sort things out in unfamiliar situations or circumstances.While these funds of knowledge seem similar in how they help individuals manage social relationships, their influence on first-generation college students' identity development differs.Perspective-taking supported firstgeneration college students' performance/competence beliefs and interest in engineering, while their mediational abilities supported only their bids for recognition.
Having a dispositional outlook of perspective-taking adds to an engineer's problem-scoping capability by allowing students to think critically and incorporate perspectives often ignored or left invisible in the decision-making process (Hess et al., 2017;Leydens & Lucena, 2017).The perspective-taking fund of knowledge is also linked to empathic practices, and empathy is an attribute engineers should emulate in their practice (Hess et al., 2016;Park & Raile, 2010;Parker & Axtell, 2001;Strobel et al., 2013).Additionally, the leadership and management literature confirms the importance of perspective-taking, noting that this capacity is essential for effective leadership, as it supports solving problems and implementing change through perspectives different from one's own (Northouse, 2016).Studies have also found emotionally intelligent leaders possess and utilize the interpersonal skill of perspective-taking to cultivate cooperative behaviors (Parker & Axtell, 2001), enhance team communication (Park & Raile, 2010), and amplify creativity when working in teams (Hoever et al., 2012).Even though perspective-taking is an applicable skill in teamwork and in the engineering design process, our study did not identify a link between perspective-taking and receiving external recognition.We suspect this is because technocentric dominant images of engineering devalue "social" skills.This is a missed opportunity, and we urge engineering educators to validate first-generation college students' perspective-taking fund of knowledge in their classroom, as this is an essential trait in engineering design and project management.
First-generation college students' ability to help others sort things out in unfamiliar situations (i.e., mediational skills) is another important fund of knowledge that can also be applied in problem-solving.Scholarship has identified mediational skills as having underlying components of active listening, summarizing and reframing problems, managing conflict, and building positive rapport (Boulle et al., 2008;Doherty & Guyler, 2008).Mediation has also been identified as a necessary workplace skill for managers and team leaders that can enhance workplace well-being, cooperation, and productivity (Doherty & Guyler, 2008).Engineers need to be able to work effectively in teams, and part of working in an effective team is having team members capable of managing conflict within and across teams (i.e., engineers and technicians).Exercising one's mediational skills prompts others to view this skill as an engineering and leadership attribute that-we believe and the data show-validated first-generation college students' bids for recognition.

| Accessing networks for advice, resources, and emotional support
Community networks play an integral role in the accumulation of funds of knowledge.Originally, the fundsof-knowledge framework demonstrated that economically marginalized families facing scarcity created social networks to facilitate the exchange of resources, information, and skills to support their homes.The framework has since expanded to acknowledge that students create networks as young adults participating in society and obtaining a higher education, among other activities (Marquez Kiyama & Rios-Aguilar, 2017).Adult students experiencing some form of "scarcity" of their own also create social networks to exchange resources, information, or skillsets to support their career paths.Our study highlights three social networks first-generation college students created to support their engineering learning: family members, college friends, and coworkers/mentors.
We confirmed that college friends are a resource that first-generation college students draw upon to support them in their engineering coursework.Another paper, focused on one Latina first-generation college student, found that forming study groups with classroom peers created an emotionally supportive "safe space" and validated her learning capabilities (Verdín, 2021a).Martin et al.'s (2020) research on first-generation college students also found that college peers were the first source they tapped into for academic support.Other studies have similarly affirmed the vital role college friends have in supporting engineering students' navigation and persistence (Denton & Borrego, 2021;Martin et al., 2020;Simmons & Martin, 2014).In our study, networks of college friends provided first-generation college students with the necessary advice, resources, and emotional support to help them through difficult engineering course material.Moreover, accessing this network of peers validated first-generation college students' bids for external recognition.Since peers can influence one's perception of how engineers should behave, when external recognition by peers is not conferred to a student, it may lead them to feel that who they are as engineers is incongruent with who engineers should be.Furthermore, if the role performance expected in the classroom environment is incongruent with firstgeneration college students' perceptions of themselves, this may undermine their views of themselves as engineers.First-generation college students must feel as if their bids for recognition are validated by their peers so the exchange of advice, resources, and support can positively influence their identity formation.
Studies have confirmed that family members influence students' choice to pursue engineering (Cruz & Kellam, 2018;Dorie et al., 2014;Liu et al., 2021).Martin et al. (2014) have confirmed that first-generation college students access resources similar to those of their continuing-generation college student peers, dispelling a common misconception that they lack resources or social capital in engineering.First-generation college students' families have been found to provide broad encouragement, motivating them to work hard and obtain a promising career (Martin et al., 2020).Our findings extend those reported in Martin and colleagues' work by underscoring how family members reinforce first-generation college students' learning through advice, resources, and emotional support and, in turn, how these efforts support the development of an engineering identity.Even though, by definition, first-generation college students would not have parents with 4-year engineering degrees, it is crucial to note that the capital provided by family members was the only fund of knowledge that had a direct and positive impact on how they saw themselves as engineers.Thus, first-generation college students do come from families that are supportive of their engineering career pathway, a narrative that has been long overshadowed by the deficit views of their families (e.g., Engle, 2007;Ives & Castillo-Montoya, 2020;Raque-Bogdan & Lucas, 2016;Stephens et al., 2012).
Accessing networks of coworkers and mentors had a negative direct relationship with engineering identity but did support interest in engineering.We suspect this may be because coworkers and mentors represent sources of authority and legitimacy in engineering workplaces that are in tension with students' current engineering role identity.If these networks espouse more traditional definitions of who engineers are and what they do, this could preclude first-generation college students' self-identification as engineers.Hence mentors, especially faculty and coworkers, should reflect on how their advice could reinforce traditional stereotypes of an engineer.Instead, through proper mentoring, faculty and coworkers could help highlight the contributions that engineers who were the first in their families to attend college have made to engineering and society in general, first, as technicians where these demographics are more welcomed (e.g., Noble, 2017), and, second, by understanding the structural constraints that historically had been put in place to keep these demographic groups away from engineering (Smith Rolston & Cox, 2015;Slaton, 2010;Zussman, 1985).

| Capitalizing on funds of knowledge: Connecting experiences
The construct connecting experiences sought to capture the shift from simply recognizing students' funds of knowledge to acknowledging its application in engineering coursework.It was initially developed as a higher order representation of students' funds of knowledge rather than a specific form of knowledge, such as tinkering knowledge from home.Results from this study show that the fund of knowledge of connecting experiences supported students' performance/ competence beliefs and their external recognition as engineers.This relationship underscores the potential power of transforming funds of knowledge into forms of capital that can support positive student outcomes (Rios-Aguilar et al., 2011).The acquisition of engineering skills and students' confidence in understanding course material should not be limited to traditional classroom settings.Students' lived experiences, home, and work environments should be leveraged to help bridge engineering ways of knowing and doing.When first-generation college students can connect and capitalize on their home experiences to scaffold their learning, that connection and capitalization can increase their confidence in performing well in their engineering coursework and support their bids for recognition.Students have also been enculturated into believing that there is only one way of knowing and doing engineering.How a profession bounds its epistemologies has implications for how students come to see themselves in relation to that profession.Scholars have well documented that the field of engineering has shifted toward a narrow focus on scientific and analytical knowledge obtained through academic means (as summarized in Kant & Kerr, 2019), thus neglecting the value of practical knowledge gained through hands-on experiences or in a work setting.Yet, our study highlights the importance of recognizing the practical knowledge gained through hands-on experiences or personal experiences outside of academia.Engineering ways of knowing and doing have undergone cultural shifts over the centuries (Kant & Kerr, 2019), and the field of engineering is now in a position to shift its epistemology to include and validate the everyday experiences, knowledge, and practices of students as valuable sources of learning.Helping to validate everyday knowledge can be achieved by allowing students to adapt engineering problems to incorporate their own tinkering experiences at home or in their community (refer to Leydens &Lucena, 2017, andMogul &Tomblin, 2019 for examples).

| PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Our study adds to the growing evidence of the importance of developing an engineering role identity (Godwin & Kirn, 2020;Jones et al., 2013;Patrick et al., 2018;Verdín, 2021b;Verdín & Godwin, 2021).Our results lead us to advocate for first-generation college students' funds of knowledge to be mobilized by engineering educators for pedagogical purposes.Leveraging students' lived experiences, accumulated through everyday practices, allows them to create continuity between their social position and learning engineering to help inform their identity development.Conversely, failing to leverage first-generation college students' funds of knowledge in the classroom is a missed opportunity that may hamper their development of an engineering role identity.Engineering educators should consider mechanisms to reinforce student interest and beliefs in their performance capabilities, validate their bids for recognition through pedagogical choices, and, perhaps more importantly, connect the content of engineering courses to the funds of knowledge that have the most impact on identity development.As we and others have argued, the development of an engineering role identity occurs within students' social position and contextual constraints: communities of practice, structures, and/or sociohistorical legacies with their own biases (Schwartz et al., 2011).It can be challenging to incorporate personal experiences into STEM education because of historical practices of teaching and learning, as highlighted by Civil (2016).Engineering educators need to find ways to incorporate students' funds of knowledge into their classrooms to support the development of students' identities in the field.
Efforts to help first-generation college students develop their identification as an engineer in the classroom have been limited, except for Svihla et al.'s (2022) recent effort.There is evidence that these students apply their funds of knowledge without the support of instructors (Smith & Lucena, 2016), and there are opportunities to celebrate and connect students' funds of knowledge to their engineering studies at the edges of the engineering curriculum, such as through makerspace clubs, design projects, and reflective writing in humanities and social science classes.However, there is still much potential for engineering educators to encourage students to draw from their funds of knowledge in the core of the engineering curriculum, such as basic math and science courses and engineering science courses, as well as in programs designed to prepare students for these core courses, such as summer bridge camps, pre-engineering programs at community colleges, and preparatory courses.
How can engineering educators explicitly begin to apply students' funds of knowledge in their classrooms to support the mechanisms that promote identity development?We provide preliminary recommendations on leveraging firstgeneration college students' funds of knowledge to enhance interest in engineering, strengthen performance/ competence beliefs, and support bids for recognition.For example, educators can provide opportunities to tap into students' important perspective-taking funds of knowledge in course assignments by rewriting engineering problems to include different perspectives of people they are interested in serving.Educators can also encourage knowledge acquired from tinkering at home to inform the rewriting of engineering problems, including home-related activities such as repairing, assembling, or building.Leydens and Lucena (2017) have shown how engineering problems can be rewritten in many engineering science courses to include different perspectives of groups that engineers are interested in serving.In addition, instructors and advisors can invite students to outline their funds of knowledge and see how they map against well-established and validated career competencies, such as communication, teamwork, and critical thinking, and how to incorporate these in resumés and interviews (National Association of Colleges and Employers, 2022).This strategy capitalizes first-generation college students' funds of knowledge into social and cultural capital needed for career advancement.
Furthermore, educators can teach students to map their perspectives to help them find more rewarding opportunities to connect with engineering, for example, through theses or capstone projects.When mapping their perspectives, educators can invite first-generation college students to reflect on their funds of knowledge on their path to school, the knowledge required to define and solve problems, and their desires for engineering contributions to society.After this perspectivemapping, rooted mainly in their funds of knowledge, first-generation college students will be more ready to scope, define, and be involved in engineering projects that are meaningful to them and the people and problems they care about.
Lastly, to enhance engineering performance/competence beliefs and recognition, engineering educators could provide first-generation college students in-class opportunities to help identify lived experiences and capitalize on their relevance in engineering problem-solving practices.Smith and Lucena (2016) showed, for example, how first-generation college students used home experiences, such as helping their families do maintenance of rental properties or reuse/resell garage sale items to make a living, to hone their problem-solving skills amid scarcity.If engineering educators can make these connecting experiences visible and valued in how first-generation college students solve problems in the engineering classroom, the students can contribute to their engineering performance/competence beliefs, recognition, and bolster their interest.An important caveat is that women and men often have disparate experiences.More often, men's experiences are seen as valuable ways of doing engineering (Faulkner, 2011;Powell et al., 2009;Tonso, 1999).Educators need to be mindful of the gendered ways of being like an engineer that is more often celebrated in the classroom and find ways of positioning fewer masculine experiences at the forefront of engineering.Through a shift from masculine experiences to feminine experiences, women can have more opportunities to leverage their hobbies or home activities in the classroom, promote confidence in their abilities, and ultimately support the development of an engineering role identity.

| CONCLUSION
Engineering educators should consider students' funds of knowledge and the connection between their lived experiences and the content taught in class.Capitalizing on students' funds of knowledge to learn engineering content offers a student-centered approach that supports engineering identity development.We investigated if and how firstgeneration college students' funds of knowledge inform the development of an engineering role identity by examining their relationship with three important facets: interest, performance/competence beliefs, and external/internal recognition.We found that first-generation college students' beliefs about performing well in their engineering coursework could be explained through their tinkering knowledge abilities learned at home, perspective-taking capability, and recognizing and capitalizing on their home knowledge (i.e., connecting experiences).Their interest in engineering was further validated by their experiences and learned skills through tinkering at home, perspective-taking, and the social network built through coworkers or mentors.First-generation college students' bids for recognition were actualized through the support offered by college friends, their mediational skills, and connecting their lived experiences.Of the seven funds-of-knowledge constructs examined in this study, only one directly supported students' perceptions of themselves as engineers: their family network.Overall, this work helps lay the foundation for future work exploring relationships between funds of knowledge and identity development among racial and ethnic groups, students from different socioeconomic statuses, and transfer students.

ORCID
Demographics of the first-generation college student sample.
T A B L E 1 knowledge from home Tinkering knowledge from home relates to activities (i.e., repairing, assembling, or building) that students have engaged with in their home environment T A B L E 3 Summary of measurement model estimates and factor reliabilities.