Creating STEM Opportunities for High-Achieving Rural Alabama Students

为阿拉巴马州农村成绩优异的学生创造 STEM 机会

• 批准号: 1929409
• 负责人: Sara Johnson
• 金额: $ 64.76万
• 依托单位: University of North Alabama
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-01-01 至 2024-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1929409&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Creating; STEM; Opportunities; Achieving; Rural

With funding from the NSF Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (S-STEM) program, this project will provide scholarships to academically promising, low-income students drawn from the Alabama rural catchment region. By engaging local high schools, families, and support systems, this program will develop a pathway for rural students in the region to enroll in STEM programs at the University of North Alabama. Scholars will be provided with a tailored yet diverse breadth of academic and co-curricular opportunities to promote retention, graduation, and success in the STEM workforce. The goal of the program will be for at least 90% of S-STEM scholarship recipients to enter a STEM-related career and/or pursue graduate STEM studies. Graduates of the program will support the growing economic and industrial needs of the region as STEM job growth is expected to increase by over 20% in north Alabama by 2026. The program has the potential to provide innovative best practices that may be used to increase STEM retention, graduation, and workforce development at other institutions that serve rural students.The S-STEM Scholars program will strive to graduate at least 75% of its Scholars in eight semesters and increase the University of North Alabama's four-year graduation rate by sixteen percentage points. To achieve these goals, Scholars will be offered a well-coordinated blend of academic and co-curricular activities, including college orientation, faculty mentoring and institutional advising, community engagement, career and entrepreneurial opportunities, University support services, and institutional engagement. To determine the effectiveness of program activities on the recruitment, retention, and graduation of STEM students from rural backgrounds, as well as changes in perceptions related to college, belonging, and careers, the current program project will compare S-STEM Scholars (the treatment group) with non-Scholars (control group). The program will use a matched sample approach to identify non-Scholars who share as many characteristics with the treatment group as possible. The differences between the treatment and control groups will be analyzed using a between-subjects and within-subjects design. Specifically, this study will examine if the additional activities offered to Scholars, and the levels of participation by Scholars, result in significant differences in outcomes. The project will use a mixed-method design that will involve collecting, analyzing, and integrating quantitative data from survey questions and qualitative data from focus groups. By using different methods and techniques, it will allow for corroboration of the robustness of the findings and their generalizability to other institutions that serve rural students.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.

通过NSF奖学金的科学，技术，工程和数学（S-STEM）计划的资金，该项目将为来自阿拉巴马州农村集水区吸引的学术有前途的低收入学生提供奖学金。通过参与当地的高中，家庭和支持系统，该计划将为该地区的农村学生开发一条途径，以在北阿拉巴马大学参加STEM计划。学者将获得量身定制但多样化的学术和课外机会，以促进STEM劳动力的保留，毕业和成功。该计划的目标是让至少90％的S-STEM奖学金获得者进入与STEM相关的职业和/或从事研究生STEM研究。该计划的毕业生将支持该地区日益增长的经济和工业需求，因为到2026年，阿拉巴马州北部的STEM就业增长将增长超过20％。该计划有可能提供创新的最佳实践，这些实践可能用于增加STEM保留，毕业和劳动力的劳动力发展的其他机构，以帮助北部的STEM Scholars计划的Schol。阿拉巴马州的四年毕业率提高了16个百分点。为了实现这些目标，将为学者提供良好的学术和课外活动融合，包括大学定向，教师指导和机构咨询，社区参与，职业和企业家机会，大学支持服务和机构参与。为了确定计划活动对来自农村背景的STEM学生的招聘，保留和毕业的有效性，以及与大学，归属和职业相关的看法的变化，当前的计划项目将比较S-STEM学者（治疗组）与非SCHOLARS（对照组）（对照组）。该计划将使用匹配的样本方法来识别与治疗组尽可能多的特征共享特征的非督学。治疗组和对照组之间的差异将使用受试者间和受试者内部设计进行分析。具体而言，这项研究将检查是否提供给学者的其他活动以及学者的参与水平会导致结果显着差异。该项目将使用混合方法设计，该设计将涉及从调查问题和焦点小组的定性数据中收集，分析和集成定量数据。通过使用不同的方法和技术，它将允许证实调查结果的鲁棒性及其对服务于农村学生的机构的鲁棒性。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是值得通过基金会的智力优点和更广泛影响的审查标准来评估的。