Collaborative Research: EAGER: Using allies to expand your network: Implementing a psychological methodology to attract and retain underrepresented (UR) students in geoscience

合作研究：EAGER：利用盟友来扩展你的网络：实施心理学方法来吸引和留住地球科学领域代表性不足（UR）的学生

• 批准号: 2206125
• 负责人: Jeffrey Nittrouer
• 金额: $ 25.34万
• 依托单位: Texas Tech 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: 2021-12-15 至 2024-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2206125&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; EAGER; Using; allies

Geoscience maintains a base-rate problem with respect to diversity: ethnic minorities and people with disabilities are highly underrepresented. This has been traced to a variety of barriers for underrepresented (UR) ethnic scholars including: a lack of geoscience majors at HBCUs and primarily Hispanic-serving institutions, a lack of experience with, and time spent in, nature (e.g., 3% of visitors to U.S. national parks are Black and Hispanic), and negative attitudes about career prospects. For people with disabilities, the main challenge is accessibility and the provision of appropriate accommodations. UR individuals may self-select out of geoscience programs due to these perceptions and barriers. This project will test the idea that allies, or members of dominant social identities, are best situated to positively influence these statistics. Academic allies, whether faculty or graduate student teaching assistants, have tremendous impact on their students’ academic engagement and can serve as linchpins for improving the future trajectories of UR students. PIs will train individuals in effective allyship behaviors, and incentivize them to recruit UR students into their academic field trips. The PIs plan to target allies who engage in field research and education, as geoscience is a unique STEM field insofar as much of the data collection and skill development are practiced out in nature at locations around the world. The PIs propose testing a strategy to overcome barriers in this context for UR students, as positive (or negative) experiences in field settings have profound impacts on recruitment and retention.This project will facilitate training and assessment of approximately 80 academic allies and measure the effect of that training on allies as well as hundreds of majority and UR students. The expectation is that the training will produce a secondary effect: academic allies role model effective behaviors to all of their students and faculty networks, creating a “train-the-trainer” ripple effect. The PIs will use academic field trips as a vehicle for measurement, including multisource ratings, applying 360-degree-type ratings typically collected in performance appraisals to this setting. Deliverables include an experimental, longitudinal (over time), and multisource analysis of the allyship program and its improvement of allyship-related attitudes and behaviors, as well as its impact on the performance of UR students. These results will inform research efforts regarding the effectiveness of implemented strategies, and the materials and procedure will be made open-source for maximum replicability. A capstone conference will be used to disseminate findings to all participating allies and UR students, inform about methodologies that improve attraction and retention of UR groups in the geosciences, and expand UR networks.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.

地球科学在多样性方面存在一个基本问题：少数族裔和残疾人的代表性严重不足，这可以追溯到代表性不足 (UR) 种族学者的各种障碍，包括： HBCU 缺乏地球科学专业，而且主要是西班牙裔。 - 服务机构、缺乏与自然相处的经验和时间（例如，美国国家公园的游客中有 3% 是黑人和西班牙裔），以及对职业前景的消极态度。由于这些看法和障碍，主要的挑战是可达性和适当住宿的提供。该项目将检验盟友或主流社会身份的成员最适合积极的想法。这些统计数据，无论是教师还是研究生助教，都对学生的学术参与产生巨大影响，并且可以作为改善 UR 学生未来发展轨迹的关键，将培训个人有效的联盟行为并激励他们。 PI 计划招募 UR 学生参加他们的学术实地考察，因为地球科学是一个独特的 STEM 领域，因为大部分数据收集和技能开发都是在地球周围的自然环境中进行的。 PI 提议测试一项策略，以克服 UR 学生在这方面的障碍，因为实地环境中的积极（或消极）经历对招募和保留具有深远影响。该项目将促进对约 80 名学术盟友的培训和评估，并进行衡量。该培训的效果预计培训将产生二次效应：学术盟友向所有学生和教师网络树立有效行为榜样，产生“培训师培训”连锁反应。 PI 将使用学术实地考察作为衡量工具，包括多源评级，将绩效评估中通常收集的 360 度评级应用于此环境，可交付成果包括对盟友的实验性、纵向（随着时间的推移）和多源分析。程序及其对与盟友关系相关的态度和行为的改善，以及对 UR 学生表现的影响。这些结果将为有关实施策略有效性的研究工作提供信息，并且材料和程序将开源，以实现最大程度的可复制性。顶点会议将用于向所有参与的盟友和 UR 学生传播研究结果，告知提高 UR 群体在地球科学领域的吸引力和保留率的方法，并扩大 UR 网络。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并被认为值得支持通过使用基金会的智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估。