Exploring Engineering Graduate Students' Perceptions of Creativity in Academic and Research Environments

The purpose of this full research paper is to understand the creative climate of graduate-level engineering education by exploring engineering graduate students' perceptions of creativity in academic and research environments. At its core, the profession of engineering is focused on developing creative solutions to complex problems. Despite increasing calls for engineering education to engage students in curricula that foster creativity, literature shows that in actuality, students do not feel that engineering programs place a high value on fostering creativity. While several studies on creativity at the undergraduate level have attempted to address this discrepancy, there is little research at the graduate level. However, studying creativity at the graduate level is essential because creativity is required to generate new knowledge through research. This study seeks to address the gap in knowledge about graduate-level creativity through a thematic analysis of five semi-structured interviews with engineering graduate students. These interviews are part of a larger mixed-methods research project with the goal of characterizing the creative climate of graduate-level engineering education. In the interviews, we asked participants about their creative endeavors, how they define creativity, and their perceptions of creativity within engineering. We used Hunter et al.'s (2005) creative climate dimensions as a theoretical framework to assess the creative climate of graduate-level engineering education and account for academia's complex interpersonal relationships and organizational structures. Results demonstrate that many of the creative climate dimensions are absent from research group and classroom environments in graduate-level engineering education. This paper is one of the first to explore engineering graduate students' perceptions of creativity within their academic and research environments and offers implications for how graduate-level engineering education can better foster creativity.