Abstract

Background: The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program faces a critical workforce shortage, yet little is known about the knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs of nutrition students and recent graduates regarding WIC career pathways, requirements, and compensation. Understanding these factors is essential to design strategies to strengthen recruitment and build a sustainable WIC workforce. Objective: To identify and describe knowledge, attitudes and beliefs on entering the WIC workforce among college nutrition and dietetics students and recent graduates. Design: A mixed-methods, sequential study design which included a cross-sectional survey and two focus groups was employed to ascertain perceptions of WIC careers among college nutrition and dietetic students and recent graduates.  Participants: Participants were age 18 years or older, able to speak, read and write in English, enrolled or recently graduated within the last 12 months from a dietetics-related undergraduate or graduate program, completed a course involving community or lifecycle nutrition, and did not have previous WIC employment. A total of 364 accessed the survey and n=208 were included in the analysis. Focus group participants were recruited from the survey sample. Analysis: Quantitative results were reported using descriptive statistics, including frequencies, range, mean and standard deviation. Chi-square tests were conducted to evaluate the relationship between unpaid professional experience and interest level towards becoming a WIC Qualified Nutritionist as well as the highest degree participants intended to pursue and their feelings on how much of their degree they would use in a WIC career. Focus group transcripts were digitally transcribed verbatim. Codes were developed using an inductive thematic approach. Results: A total of 208 individuals completed the survey: 181 were current undergraduate or graduate students and 27 were recent graduates. Sixteen of these respondents participated in focus groups, including 14 students and 2 recent graduates. Participants largely understood WIC program and job offerings but lacked certainty regarding WIC job requirements. Participants overwhelmingly believed that WIC was an important program and believed that they would be internally fulfilled working at WIC, but external factors such as low compensation, job stability, additional education requirements and perceived limitations in scope of practice and growth are barriers to entering into a WIC career. Conclusions: While nutrition students and graduates view WIC careers as meaningful, barriers such as limited career awareness, unclear pathways for growth, perceived low compensation, and perceptions of limiting roles may hinder recruitment. These results demonstrate the need for clearer communication, salary transparency, experiential learning opportunities, and visibility of bachelor’s-level opportunities. Future research is needed to analyze themes within individual participants’ responses and examine the impact of policy changes, such as the new master’s degree requirement for RDNs, on workforce diversity and accessibility.

Publication Date

3-2-2026

Document Type

Thesis

Student Type

Graduate

Degree Name

Dietetics and Nutrition (MS)

Department, Program, or Center

Wegmans School of Health and Nutrition

College

College of Health Sciences and Technology

Advisor

Elizabeth Ruder

Advisor/Committee Member

Nicole Trabold

Advisor/Committee Member

Brenda Ariba Zahari Abu

Campus

RIT – Main Campus

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