The independent evaluation firm Knight Williams, Inc. conducted a formative evaluation during Year 2 of the SciGirls CONNECT2 program in order to gather information about the partner educators’ use of, reflections on, and recommendations relating to the draft updated SciGirls Strategies. The evaluation aimed for two educators from each of 14 partner organizations – specifically the program leader and one educator who was familiar with the original SciGirls Seven – to provide reflections on their use of the draft SciGirls Strategies in their programs through an online survey and follow-up
The independent evaluators at Knight Williams Inc. developed a front-end survey to gather background and baseline information about the 16 partner organizations selected to conduct outreach programs as part of SciGirls CONNECT2. The goal was for two people from each partner organization to complete the online survey about their background and prior use of the SciGirls Seven and related strategies. A total of 30 partner representatives completed the survey by the requested deadline, resulting in a response rate of 94%. The majority identified as program leaders, with smaller groups saying they
The NIH Science Education Partnership Award (SEPA) program of Emory University endeavors to use an over-arching theme of citizen science principles to:
develop an innovative curriculum based on citizen science and experiential learning to evaluate the efficacy of informal science education in after-school settings;
promote biomedical scientific careers in under-represented groups targeting females for Girls for Science summer research experiences;
train teachers in Title I schools to implement this citizen science based curriculum; and
disseminate the citizen science principles through outreach.
This novel, experiential science and engineering program, termed Experiential Citizen Science Training for the Next Generation (ExCiTNG), encompasses community-identified topics reflecting NIH research priorities. The curriculum is mapped to Next Generation Science Standards.
A comprehensive evaluation plan accompanies each program component, composed of short- and/or longer-term outcome measures. We will use our existing outreach program (Students for Science) along with scientific community partnerships (Atlanta Science Festival) to implement key aspects of the program throughout the state of Georgia. These efforts will be overseen by a central Steering Committee composed of leadership of the Community Education Research Program of the Emory/Morehouse/Georgia Institute of Technology Atlanta Clinical Translational Science Institute (NIH CTSA), the Principal Investigators, representatives of each program component, and an independent K–12 STEM evaluator from the Georgia Department of Education.
The Community Advisory Board, including educators, parents, and community members, will help guide the program’s implementation and monitor progress. A committee of NIH-funded investigators, representing multiple NIH institutes along with experienced science writers, will lead the effort for dissemination and assure that on-going and new NIH research priorities are integrated into the program’s curriculum over time.
This project specifically addresses the SMRB’s imperative that “NIH’s pre-college STEM activities need a rejuvenated integrated focus on biomedical workforce preparedness with special considerations for under-represented minorities.”
Approximately one-third of CityLab’s participants are under-represented minority (URM) students, but we now have a unique opportunity to build a program that will reach many URM students and position them for undergraduate STEM success. We have partnered with urban squash education organizations in Boston (SquashBusters) and New York (CitySquash and StreetSquash) that recruit URM/low SES students to participate in after-school squash training and academic enrichment programs. We have also partnered with the Squash + Education Alliance (previously named the National Urban Squash and Education Association) to disseminate the new program—first from Boston to New York and later through its national network of affiliated squash education programs.
In order to bring this project to fruition, Boston University is joining forces with Fordham University in New York. Fordham is home to CitySquash so these organizations provide an ideal base for the New York activities. The proposed project will enable us to demonstrate feasibility and replicability within the 5-year scope of this grant. Our shared vision is to develop a national model for informal precollege biomedical science education that can be infused into a myriad of similar athletic/academic enrichment programs.
The squash education movement for urban youth has been highly successful in enrolling program graduates in college. Since the academic offerings of the squash education programs focus on English Language Arts and Mathematics, their students struggle with science and rarely recognize the tremendous opportunities for long- term employment in STEM fields.
This project will bring CityLab’s resources to local squash programs in a coordinated and sustained engagement to introduce students to STEM, specifically the biomedical sciences. Together with the urban squash centers, we will build upon the hands-on life science experiences developed and widely disseminated by CityLab to create engaging laboratory-based experiences involving athletics and physiology.
The specific aims of the proposed project are:
To develop, implement, and evaluate a new partnership model for recruiting URM/low SES students and inspiring them to pursue careers in STEM; and
To examine changes in the science learner identities (SLI) of the students who participate in this program and establish this metric as a marker for continued engagement in STEM.
With the involvement of the two urban research universities, three local squash education programs, and SEA, we see this new SEPA initiative as a unique way to pilot, refine, and disseminate an after-school/informal science education program that can have a significant impact on the nation’s production of talented STEM graduates from URM/low SES backgrounds.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Carl FranzblauDonald DeRosaCarla Romney
This project will examine the characteristics and outcomes of a large sample of environmental education field trip programs for youth to elucidate program characteristics that most powerfully influence 21st century learning outcomes. Environmental education programs for youth, particularly day-long school trip programs, are popular and reside at the intersection of formal and informal STEM education. Such field trips provide opportunities for diverse audiences to participate in shared learning experiences, but current understanding of what leads to success in these programs is limited. This large-scale study will address this gap in knowledge by investigating the linkages between program characteristics and participant outcomes for at least 800 single-day environmental education field trip programs for youth in grades 5-8, particularly programs for diverse and underserved audiences. This study will result in the identification of evidence-based practices that will inform future program design for a wide variety of settings, including nature centers, national parks, zoos, museums, aquaria, and other locations providing informal environmental education programs.
This Research in Service to Practice study is guided by two research questions: 1) What program characteristics (context, design, and delivery) most powerfully influence learner self-determination and learner outcomes? And 2) Do the most influential program characteristics differ across diverse and underserved audiences (e.g. African American, Hispanic/Latino, economically disadvantaged) and contexts (e.g. rural versus urban)? This project will examine a wide range of program-related factors, including pedagogical approaches and contextual characteristics. A valid and reliable protocol for observing 78 program characteristics hypothesized to influence learner outcomes developed by a previous project will be used to systematically sample and observe 500 single-day environmental education field trip programs for youth in grades 5-8 distributed across at least 40 U.S. states and territories. Programs for diverse and underserved youth will be emphasized, and a diverse set of programs in terms of program type and context will be sought. Data from this sample will be combined with those of an existing sample of 334 programs provided by over 90 providers. The final combined sample of over 800 programs will provide sufficient statistical power to confidently identify which program components are most consistently linked with learning outcomes. This sample size will also enable stratification of the sample for examination of these relationships within relevant subpopulations. Principal component analyses will be used to reduce data in theoretically meaningful and statistically valid ways, and multilevel structural equation modeling will be employed to examine the influences of both participants' individual characteristics and program and context characteristics on participant outcomes. Since one research question focuses on whether program outcomes are the same across different audiences, the project will include at least 200 programs for each of three specific audiences to ensure sufficient statistical power for confidence in the results: primarily African American, primarily Hispanic/Latino, and primarily White.
This project is funded by the National Science Foundation's (NSF's) Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which supports innovative research, approaches, and resources for use in a variety of learning settings.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Robert PowellMarc SternBrandon Frensley
In this paper, we use the concept of consequential learning to frame our exploration of what makes learning and doing science matter for youth from nondominant communities, as well as the barriers these youth must confront in working toward consequential ends. Data are derived from multimodal cases authored by four females from nondominant communities that present an account of 'science that matters' from their work during their middle school years. We argue that consequential learning in science for these girls involves engaging science with a commitment to their community. This form of
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Daniel BirminghamAngela Calabrese BartonAutumn McDanielJalah JonesCamryn TurnerAngel Roberts
Since 1992, the WSU Math Corps, a combined mathematics and mentoring program, has worked to make a difference in the lives of Detroit’s children—providing them with the love and support that all kids need in the moment, while empowering them with the kinds of educational opportunities and sense of purpose, that hold the promise of good lives for themselves and a better world for all.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Steve KahnStephen ChrisomalisTodd KubicaCarol Philips-BeyFrancisca Richter
We present results of an experimental study of an urban, museum-based science teacher PD programme. A total of 125 teachers and 1676 of their students in grades 4–8 were tested at the beginning and end of the school year in which the PD programme took place. Teachers and students were assessed on subject content knowledge and attitudes towards science, along with teacher classroom behaviour. Subject content questions were mostly taken from standardised state tests and literature, with an ‘Explain:’ prompt added to some items. Teachers in the treatment group showed a 7% gain in subject content
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative research, approaches and resources for use in a variety of settings. Informal STEM educational activities have proliferated widely in the US over the last 20 years. Additional research will further validate the long-term benefits of this mode of learning. Thus, elaborating the multitude of variables in informal learning and how those variables can be used for individual learning is yet to be defined for the circumstances of the learners. Thus, the primary objective of this work is to produce robust and detailed evidence to help shape both practice and policy for informal STEM learning in a broad array of common circumstances such as rural, urban, varying economic situations, and unique characteristics and cultures of citizen groups. Rather than pursuing a universal model of informal learning, the principal investigator will develop a series of comprehensive models that will support learning in informal environments for various demographic groups. The research will undertake a longitudinal mixed-methods approach of Out of School Time/informal STEM experiences over a five-year time span of data collection for youth ages 9-19 in urban, suburban, town, and rural communities. The evidence base will include data on youth experiences of informal STEM, factors that exert an influence on participation in informal STEM, the impact of participation on choices about educational pathways and careers, and preferences for particular types of learning activities. The quantitative data will include youth surveys, program details (e.g. duration of program, length of each program session, youth/facilitator ratio, etc.), and demographics. The qualitative data will include on-site informal interviews with youth and facilitators, and program documentation. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
Techbridge Girls’ mission is to help girls discover a passion for science, engineering, and technology (SET). In August 2013, Techbridge Girls was awarded a five-year National Science Foundation grant to scale up its afterschool program from the San Francisco Bay Area to multiple new locations around the United States. Techbridge Girls began offering afterschool programming at elementary and middle schools in Greater Seattle in 2014, and in Washington, DC in 2015.
Education Development Center is conducting the formative and summative evaluation of the project. To assess the implementation
Techbridge Girls’ mission is to help girls discover a passion for science, engineering, and technology (SET). In August 2013, Techbridge Girls was awarded a five-year National Science Foundation grant to scale up its afterschool program from the San Francisco Bay Area to multiple new locations around the United States. Techbridge Girls began offering afterschool programming at elementary and middle schools in Greater Seattle in 2014, and in Washington, DC in 2015.
Education Development Center is conducting the formative and summative evaluation of the project. To assess the implementation