Supporting Perseverance and Degree Completion in a Diverse Undergraduate STEM Cohort through Scholarships, Peer Academic Coaching, and a Career Education Curriculum

通过奖学金、同伴学术辅导和职业教育课程，支持多元化本科 STEM 群体的毅力和完成学位

• 批准号: 2030972
• 负责人: Kevin Johnson
• 金额: $ 98.91万
• 依托单位: Pacific University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-05-01 至 2026-04-30
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2030972&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Supporting; Perseverance; Degree; Completion; Diverse

This project will contribute to the national need for well-educated scientists and mathematicians by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students with demonstrated financial need at Pacific University. This University is a small residential undergraduate liberal arts institution with a focus on serving regional and local underserved populations. Over its five-year duration, this project will fund scholarships to 65 unique full-time students who are pursuing Bachelor of Science degrees in bioinformatics, biology, chemistry, computer science, environmental science, mathematics, and physics. Students in this ‘small-college-model’ cohort will include first-year, returning, and transfer students. Scholars will receive two to four years of scholarship support and concurrent targeted support services through their fourth year of undergraduate study. The project is designed to serve a cohort of Scholars that is diverse in both STEM discipline and academic year in college. It is expected that this diversity will create an environment that promotes academic and social success through peer support and interdisciplinary STEM learning and discovery. Building on the University’s existing student support services, the project will pilot test and evaluate the effects of two new academic support programs for STEM students: structured STEM-specific peer academic coaching and mentoring, and a three-course STEM career education curriculum. The project seeks to advance understanding of the extent to which financial support, faculty mentoring, peer coaching and mentoring, career education, and cohort development may synergistically support student persistence to degrees in STEM disciplines. As a result, it has the potential to broaden participation in the national STEM workforce.The overall goal of this project is to increase STEM degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need. This program will support Scholars’ completion of baccalaureate STEM degrees and prepare them for STEM careers. Programmatic elements of the project include weekly seminar meetings, peer academic coaching, and a STEM career education curriculum. Formative assessment of these targeted programmatic elements will inform ongoing implementation and identify best practices for supporting students' persistence in STEM. To evaluate Scholars’ development of a professional and social orientation toward STEM disciplines, the cohort will be evaluated via a longitudinal study that will survey students’ self-reported ‘belonging’ in STEM course work, STEM self-identification, perceived faculty and institutional support, perceived parental/family support, and STEM career orientation. Participant’s academic and professional outcomes will be correlated to their professional and social development as well as participation in the project interventions. This project will address a knowledge gap in post-secondary STEM education research regarding best practices for delivery of STEM-specific peer academic coaching and career education curriculum. In addition to dissemination to the STEM education community through presentations and publications, the conclusions of this study will be disseminated within professional organizations for undergraduate academic support and career services. This project is funded by NSF’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, which seeks to increase the number of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need who earn degrees in STEM fields. It also aims to improve the education of future STEM workers, and to generate knowledge about academic success, retention, transfer, graduation, and academic/career pathways of low-income 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.

该项目将通过支持有经济需要的成绩优异的低收入学生在太平洋大学的保留和毕业，满足国家对受过良好教育的科学家和数学家的需求。该项目致力于为地区和当地服务不足的人群提供奖学金，该项目将在五年内为 65 名正在攻读生物信息学、生物学、化学、计算机科学、环境科学、数学、和这个“小学院模式”队列中的学生将包括一年级学生、回国学生和转学生，他们将在本科学习的第四年获得两到四年的奖学金支持和同时有针对性的支持服务。旨在为 STEM 学科和大学学年多样化的学者提供服务，预计这种多样性将创造一个通过同伴支持和跨学科 STEM 学习和发现促进学术和社会成功的环境。大学现有的学生支持服务项目将试点测试并评估两个针对 STEM 学生的新学术支持计划的效果：针对 STEM 的结构化同行学术辅导和指导，以及三门课程的 STEM 职业教育课程。该项目旨在加深对财务支持程度的了解。 、教师辅导、同伴辅导和指导、职业教育以及群体发展可以协同支持学生坚持获得 STEM 学科学位。因此，它有可能扩大对国家 STEM 劳动力的参与。该项目的总体目标是。提高STEM学位该计划将支持学者们完成 STEM 学士学位，并为他们的 STEM 职业生涯做好准备，包括每周研讨会、同行学术辅导和 STEM 培训。对这些目标计划要素的形成性评估将为持续实施提供信息，并确定支持学生坚持 STEM 的最佳实践。为了评估学者对 STEM 学科的专业和社会导向的发展，将通过纵向研究将调查学生自我报告的 STEM 课程作业“归属感”、STEM 自我认同、感知到的教师和机构支持、感知到的父母/家庭支持以及参与者的学术和专业成果，这些都将与其相关。该项目将解决中学后 STEM 教育研究中的知识差距，涉及提供 STEM 特定同伴学术辅导和职业教育课程的最佳实践。本研究的结论将通过 STEM 教育界的演示和出版物在专业组织内传播，以提供本科生学术支持和职业服务。该项目由 NSF 科学、技术、工程和数学奖学金计划资助，旨在提高本科生的学术支持和职业服务。该计划还旨在改善未来 STEM 工作者的教育，并提供有关学业成功、保留、转学、毕业和学术/职业道路的知识。的这反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。