Informal STEM learning experiences (ISLEs), such as participating in science, computing, and engineering clubs and camps, have been associated with the development of youth’s science, technology, engineering, and mathematics interests and career aspirations. However, research on ISLEs predominantly focuses on institutional settings such as museums and science centers, which are often discursively inaccessible to youth who identify with minoritized demographic groups. Using latent class analysis, we identify five general profiles (i.e., classes) of childhood participation in ISLEs from data
DATE:
TEAM MEMBERS:
Remy DouHeidi CianZahra HazariPhilip SadlerGerhard Sonnert
The project team published a research synopsis article with Futurum Science Careers in Feb 2023 called “How Can Place Attachment Improve Scientific Literacy?”
The Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum will partner with the Flowing Wells Unified School District on “We Bee Scientists,” a program to engage students in grades K–6 in real-world science by learning about bees—the most important group of pollinators. They plan to create a curriculum and related activities aligned with the Arizona science standards. The program is an expansion of the Tucson Bee Collaborative, which empowers community scientists from “K to grey” to contribute to ecosystem health and understanding through the study of native bees. The museum also will partner with Pima Community College and the University of Arizona on the program, which will involve volunteers and high school, college, and university students in documenting the abundance and diversity of native bees.
Science identity has been shown to be a necessary precondition to academic success and persistence in science trajectories. Further, science identities are formed, in large part, due to the kinds of access, real or perceived, that (racialized) learners have to science spaces. For Black and Latinx youth, in particular, mainstream ideas of science as a discipline and as a culture in the US recognize and support certain learners and marginalize others. Without developing identities as learners who can do science, or can become future scientists, these young people are not likely to pursue careers in any scientific field. There are demonstrable links between positive science identities and the material and social resources provided by particular places. Thus, whether young people can see themselves as scientists, or even feel that they have access to science practices, also depends on where they are learning it. The overarching goal of this project is to broaden participation of Black and Latinx youth in science by deepening our understanding of both science identities and how science learning spaces may be better designed to support the development of positive science identities of these learners. By deepening the field’s knowledge of how science learning spaces shape science identities, science educators can design more equitable learning spaces that leverage the spatial aspects of program location, culturally relevant curriculum, and participants’ lived experiences. A more expansive understanding of positive science identities allows educators to recognize these in Black and Latinx learners, and direct their continued science engagements accordingly, as positive identities lead to greater persistence in science. This project is a collaboration between researchers at New York University and those at a New York City informal science organization, BioBus. It is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) Program which seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments.
This participatory design research project will compare three different formats, in different settings, of afterschool science programming for middle schoolers: one located in a lab space on the campus of a nearby university, one located in the public middle school building of participating students, and one aboard a mobile science lab. For purposes of this study, the construct of “setting” refers to the dimensions of geographic location, built physical environment, and material resources. Setting is not static, but instead social and relational: it is dynamically (co)constructed and experienced in activity by individuals and in interaction by groups of individuals. Therefore, the three BioBus programming types allow for productive comparison not only because of their different geographic locations, built environments, and material resources (e.g., scientific tools), but also the existing relationships learners may have with these places, as well as the instructional designs and pedagogical practices that BioBus teaching scientists use in each. This project uses a design-based research approach to answer the following research questions: (1) How do the settings of science learning shape science identity development? What are different positive science identities that may emerge from these relationships? And (2) What are ways to leverage different spatial aspects of informal science programming and instruction to support positive science identities? The study uses ethnographic and micro-analytic methods to develop better understandings of the relationships between setting and science identity development, uncover a broad range of types of positive science identities taken up by our Black and Latinx students, and inform informal science education to design for and leverage spatial aspects of programming and instruction. Findings will contribute to a systematic knowledge base bringing together spatial aspects of informal science education and science identity and identity development, and provide new tools for informal science educators, including design principles for incorporating spatial factors into program and lesson planning.
DATE:
-
TEAM MEMBERS:
Jasmine MaLatasha WrightRoya Heydari
The Montana Natural History Center, in collaboration with the University of Montana, will develop an exhibit to showcase a selection of the university's extensive fossil collection. This new exhibit will help create inclusive, inquiry-based, educational opportunities for preschoolers through adults. University faculty will guide specimen interpretation and story development. The exhibit will explore modern research into evolution in a time of climate change, sharing ongoing university research and highlighting STEM careers and citizen science work. The project is based on interests identified through surveys, museum visitor recommendations, and a member focus group.
Final External Evaluation Report for Informal STEM Learning at Biological Field Stations, an NSF AISL Exploratory Pathways project, which studied the pedagogical and andragogical characteristics of informal educational outreach activities at field stations. This report summarizes the project team’s major research activities and the contextual factors that supported that work.
Appendix includes interview protocol.
The RASOR project is designed to increase engagement of students from rural Alaska communities in biomedical/STEM careers. Rural Alaskan communities are home to students of intersecting identities underrepresented in biomedical science, including Alaska Native, low-income, first generation college, and rural. Geographic isolation defines these communities and can limit the exposure of students to scientifically-minded peers, professional role models, and science career pathways. However these students also have a particularly strong environmental connection through subsistence and recreational activities, which makes the one-health approach to bio-medicine an intuitive and effective route for introducing scientific research and STEM content. In RASOR, we will implement place-based mentored research projects with students in rural Alaskan communities at the high school level, when most students are beginning to seriously consider career paths. The biomedical one-health approach will build connections between student experiences of village life in rural Alaska and biomedical research. Engaging undergraduate students in research has proved one of the most successful means of increasing the persistence of minority students in science (Kuh 2008). Furthermore, RASOR will integrate high school students into community-based participatory research (Israel et al. 2005). This approach is designed to demonstrate the practicality of scientific research, that science has the ability to support community and cultural priorities and to provide career pathways for individual community members. The one-health approach will provide continuity with BLaST, an NIH-funded BUILD program that provides undergraduate biomedical students with guidance and support. RASOR will work closely with BLaST, implementing among younger (pre-BLaST) students approaches that have been successful for retaining rural Alaska students along STEM pathways and tracking of post-RASOR students. Alaska Native and rural Alaska students are a unique and diverse population underrepresented in biomedical science and STEM fields.
Public trust in agricultural biotechnology organizations that produce so-called ‘genetically-modified organisms’ (GMOs) is affected by misinformed attacks on GM technology and worry that producers' concern for profits overrides concern for the public good. In an experiment, we found that reporting that the industry engages in open and transparent research practices increased the perceived trustworthiness of university and corporate organizations involved with GMOs. Universities were considered more trustworthy than corporations overall, supporting prior findings in other technology domains
DATE:
TEAM MEMBERS:
Asheley LandrumJoseph HilgardRobert LullHeather AkinKathleen Hall Jamieson
Field stations across the United States provide learning opportunities to the general public through their outreach programming. With approximately 78% and 98% of the US population living within 60 and 120 miles of a field station, respectively, stations have the potential to be key providers of informal STEM education. We surveyed a sample of US biological field stations and asked them to describe their outreach programming and goals. Our findings indicate that field stations prioritize outreach by dedicating personnel and fiscal resources, but such initiatives are highly variable in
There is growing concern that opportunities for outdoor learning by school students in England have decreased substantially in recent years. In response to this, and recent Government calls for ‘schools to make better use of the outdoor classroom as a context for teaching and learning’, the Field Studies Council (FSC) and several partner organisations commissioned the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) to undertake a review of research on outdoor learning.
This document summarises the key findings of this review, which critically examined 150 pieces of research on outdoor
DATE:
TEAM MEMBERS:
Mark RickinsonJustin DillonKelly TeameyMarian MorrisMee Young ChoiDawn SandersPauline Benefield
The Sustainability Teams Empower and Amplify Membership in STEM (S-TEAMS), an NSF INCLUDES Design and Development Launch Pilot project, will tackle the problem of persistent underrepresentation by low-income, minority, and women students in STEM disciplines and careers through transdisciplinary teamwork. As science is increasingly done in teams, collaborations bring diversity to research. Diverse interactions can support critical thinking, problem-solving, and is a priority among STEM disciplines. By exploring a set of individual contributors that can be effect change through collective impact, this project will explore alternative approaches to broadly enhance diversity in STEM, such as sense of community and perceived program benefit. The S-TEAMS project relies on the use of sustainability as the organizing frame for the deployment of learning communities (teams) that engage deeply with active learning. Studies on the issue of underrepresentation often cite a feeling of isolation and lack of academically supportive networks with other students like themselves as major reasons for a disinclination to pursue education and careers in STEM, even as the numbers of underrepresented groups are increasing in colleges and universities across the country. The growth of sustainability science provides an excellent opportunity to include students from underrepresented groups in supportive teams working together on problems that require expertise in multiple disciplines. Participating students will develop professional skills and strengthen STEM- and sustainability-specific skills through real-world experience in problem solving and team science. Ultimately this project is expected to help increase the number of qualified professionals in the field of sustainability and the number of minorities in the STEM professions.
While there is certainly a clear need to improve engagement and retention of underrepresented groups across the entire spectrum of STEM education - from K-12 through graduate education, and on through career choices - the explicit focus here is on the undergraduate piece of this critical issue. This approach to teamwork makes STEM socialization integral to the active learning process. Five-member transdisciplinary teams, from disciplines such as biology, chemistry, computer and information sciences, geography, geology, mathematics, physics, and sustainability science, will work together for ten weeks in summer 2018 on real-world projects with corporations, government organizations, and nongovernment organizations. Sustainability teams with low participation by underrepresented groups will be compared to those with high representation to gather insights regarding individual and collective engagement, productivity, and ongoing interest in STEM. Such insights will be used to scale up the effort through partnership with New Jersey Higher Education Partnership for Sustainability (NJHEPS).
DATE:
-
TEAM MEMBERS:
Amy TuiningaAshwani VasishthPankaj Lai
The Broadening Experience for Scientific Training: Beginning Enhancement Track ("BEST-BET"), an NSF INCLUDES Design and Development Launch Pilot project, draws upon the expertise of five research-intensive institutions that have developed innovative programing in career and professional development for doctoral and postdoctoral trainees in biomedical research. The goal of the project is to expand the scope and leverage the work so as to engage students earlier in their career exploration. Specifically, the project will target undergraduates who may not be aware of the multitude of career options available to them. These include opportunities in academia, the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries, science communication, science policy, and technology transfer/patent law. The effort will focus on undergraduates who come from populations generally underrepresented in STEM fields, including but not limited to ethnically, racially and socioeconomically underserved communities. The grant will support educational opportunities for students at minority-serving institutions and will assess the impact of providing new opportunities to this community. The critical contributions of a diverse and inclusive community are essential to progress in all STEM fields. By promoting diversity in education, this project aims to engage undergraduate students at a point in their professional development that could enable participation in a wide range of workforce opportunities so as to advance the progress of science and national health.
The focus of BEST BET will be to use a collective impact framework to connect the "BEST network" of institutions to partners engaged in undergraduate education of students from underrepresented communities who are interested in the life sciences. The underlying premise is that career exploration focused on opportunities that go beyond physician training will enable engagement of this community of learners in the life science workforce beyond the pre-med track and keep them engaged in degree completion. Multiple strategies will be used to attain the goals of BEST BET. They are organized in the context of two major objectives roughly divided into the scope of planned activities. The first objective focuses on "career exploration" and offers strategies to assist partner institutions to build career and skill development capacities. The second is grounded in an enhanced experience of BEST site visits whereby undergraduates will have the opportunity to envision life as a graduate student and beyond. These strategies will likely enhance persistence to complete the baccalaureate degree and move onto doctoral programs.