Actualizing STEM Potential in the Mississippi Delta

实现密西西比三角洲 STEM 潜力

• 批准号: 1511792
• 负责人: Brenda Brand
• 金额: $ 164.13万
• 依托单位: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-07-15 至 2022-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1511792&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Actualizing; STEM; Potential; Mississippi; Delta

This project will advance efforts of the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program to better understand and promote practices that increase students' motivations and capacities to pursue careers in fields of science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) by investigating the effectiveness of an existing collaborative robotics program. The program will positively influence the engineering self-efficacy and orientation to STEM majors with African American students living in an underserved region of the United States, the Mississippi Delta. Students in this program are immersed in engineering design activities requiring the application of science and mathematics principles. The program model includes pre-engineering courses in computer science, computer aided drafting, and electronics. These are designed and facilitated by university faculty. Undergraduate seniors are trained by faculty and then serve as mentors. Engineering design activities, career orientation activities and robotics summer camps for elementary and middle school students are facilitated by high school faculty. At the beginning of the spring semester, students participate in an international robotics competition. This robotics program is year-long and occurs after school, and halfway through the year students enter their designs in a robotics competition. Beginning in the freshmen year, students are allowed to remain in the program throughout their years in high school. An understanding of the components that positively influence the African American students' beliefs about their abilities in STEM disciplines and their perceptions of their identification with STEM could be useful for understanding and decreasing the gap in STEM majors that exists with students from underserved populations in the United States. This longitudinal mixed methods research study is designed to investigate the influence of engineering design and career orientation activities implemented in a collaborative robotics/pre-engineering program on African American students' self-efficacy, and scientific identity, to better understand factors influencing their achievement in STEM disciplines and orientation to STEM majors. This is a four year study, allowing the researchers to follow a group of students from freshman to the end of their senior year, so that key factors influencing the students' learning and achievement in the engineering course activities can be observed and documented during the peak years of decision making for college majors and careers. This study is unique in terms of its location and population of students, and because it is longitudinal and utilizes a mixed methods approach. While this study investigates the effectiveness of the program on the engineering self-efficacy, scientific identity and achievement of program objectives for students in this program, the findings of the study could also be valuable for informing initiatives devoted to increasing the numbers of students from other marginalized groups majoring in STEM fields. Quantitatively, this research employs pre and post measures to determine changes in students engineering self-efficacy and scientific identities. Qualitatively, field notes from classroom observations and interviews with the high school students provide data on specific program elements determined to be effective in positively influencing the African American students' achievement of program objectives and decisions to pursue STEM careers.

该项目将推进学生和教师创新技术体验 (ITEST) 计划的工作，通过调查，更好地理解和促进提高学生在科学、技术、工程或数学 (STEM) 领域追求职业的动机和能力的实践。现有协作机器人计划的有效性。该计划将对生活在美国服务欠缺地区密西西比三角洲的非裔美国学生的工程自我效能和 STEM 专业定位产生积极影响。 该项目的学生沉浸在需要应用科学和数学原理的工程设计活动中。 该项目模型包括计算机科学、计算机辅助绘图和电子学方面的预科课程。这些都是由大学教师设计和推动的。本科生由教师培训，然后担任导师。高中教师负责为中小学生举办工程设计活动、职业导向活动和机器人夏令营。 春季学期伊始，学生们参加国际机器人竞赛。 这个机器人项目为期一年，在放学后进行，学生在学年中途参加机器人竞赛，参加他们的设计。 从一年级开始，学生可以在高中期间继续参加该计划。了解对非裔美国学生对其 STEM 学科能力的信念以及他们对 STEM 认同的看法产生积极影响的组成部分，可能有助于理解和缩小与来自美国服务欠缺群体的学生之间存在的 STEM 专业差距国家。 这项纵向混合方法研究旨在调查协作机器人/工程预科项目中实施的工程设计和职业导向活动对非裔美国学生的自我效能和科学认同的影响，以更好地了解影响其成就的因素STEM 学科和 STEM 专业方向。 这是一项为期四年的研究，研究人员跟踪一组学生从大一到大四结束，以便在高峰期观察和记录影响学生在工程课程活动中学习和成绩的关键因素多年的大学专业和职业决策。 这项研究因其地点和学生群体而独特，而且因为它是纵向的并且采用了混合方法。 虽然这项研究调查了该项目对工程自我效能感、科学认同和项目目标实现的有效性，但该研究的结果对于为致力于增加其他地区学生数量的举措提供信息也很有价值。主修 STEM 领域的边缘群体。从数量上讲，本研究采用事前和事后测量来确定学生工程自我效能和科学身份的变化。 定性地讲，来自课堂观察和对高中生的采访的现场记录提供了有关特定项目要素的数据，这些要素被确定可以有效地积极影响非裔美国学生实现项目目标和追求 STEM 职业的决定。