Postdoctoral Fellowship: STEMEdIPRF: Examining how faculty awareness of systemic barriers and growth mindset influences students' belonging, self-efficacy, and success in STEM

博士后奖学金：STEMEdIPRF：研究教师对系统性障碍和成长心态的认识如何影响学生的归属感、自我效能和 STEM 成功

• 批准号: 2327319
• 负责人: Tiani Perkins
• 金额: $ 19.21万
• 依托单位: University of Massachusetts Amherst
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2024-05-01 至 2026-04-30
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2327319&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Postdoctoral; Fellowship; STEMEdIPRF; Examining; how

Traditional STEM college programs are based on cultural norms that do not account for the experiences of students with identities that are historically underrepresented in STEM. In practice, these norms may create hidden challenges to underrepresented students’ success over the course of their STEM education. This project is designed to look at college instructors as agents for change in STEM education by studying (a) their attitudes about the flexible nature of intelligence (i.e., growth mindset) and (b) their awareness of systemic barriers in STEM. Combined, these attitudes could influence the ways instructors engage in culturally relevant teaching practices and make meaning of student behaviors. This research will be of significance in advancing knowledge about STEM learning and learning environments that increase diversity, equity, and inclusion in classrooms. This project also has implications for broadening participation in STEM fields by directly studying students’ experiences as they relate to STEM instructor’s attitudes. Overall, this research could contribute to STEM instructor’s professional development and help to address the needs of an increasingly diverse student population.This study is designed to examine how STEM faculty’s awareness of systemic barriers in STEM education and growth mindset beliefs influence undergraduate students’ success in STEM. Existing quantitative research has not identified the independent contributions of these faculty attitudes for their engagement with culturally relevant teaching pedagogies, and the resulting implications for STEM students’ outcomes. Findings from this project could provide preliminary support that analysis of multiple dimensions of STEM faculty’s attitudes is crucial for addressing existing challenges to underrepresented student success. This project has three phases: 1) STEM faculty complete an online experimental survey to examine whether their awareness of systemic bias and growth mindset influences their causal attributions for an academically struggling underrepresented student. 2) Faculty and student recruitment from introductory STEM college courses to complete a survey at the beginning of the academic semester (Time 1), and students complete a follow-up survey at the end of the academic semester (Time 2). Findings are designed to examine whether faculty’s attitudes influence students’ belonging, self-efficacy, and expectations for future STEM success. 3) An online experimental design to examine whether an experimental manipulation of a hypothetical faculty member’s attitudes will influence underrepresented and traditional undergraduate students’ STEM interest, self-efficacy, and course success. Additional analysis will also be conducted in each study to explore differences by faculty and student race, gender, social class, and sexuality. This research could have important implications for STEM education by illuminating the influence of these attitudes for faculty’s causal attributions of academically struggling students; the direct implications for students’ classroom experiences; and students’ resulting attitudes about STEM. Overall, this research is designed to transform STEM education research by highlighting the critical roles of both individual and systemic factors for undergraduate student success.This project is funded by the STEM Education Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (STEM Ed PRF) program that aims to enhance the research knowledge, skills, and practices of recent doctorates in STEM, STEM education, education, and related disciplines to advance their preparation to engage in fundamental and applied research that advances knowledge within the field.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.

传统的 STEM 大学课程基于文化规范，没有考虑到历史上在 STEM 中代表性不足的学生的经历。在实践中，这些规范可能会给代表性不足的学生在 STEM 教育项目的过程中取得成功带来隐藏的挑战。旨在通过研究 (a) 他们对智力的灵活性（即成长心态）的态度和 (b) 他们对 STEM 系统性障碍的认识，将大学教师视为 STEM 教育变革的推动者。影响教师参与与文化相关的教学实践的方式，并赋予学生行为意义。这项研究对于增进有关 STEM 学习和学习环境的知识具有重要意义，从而增加课堂的多样性、公平性和包容性。通过直接研究学生的经历与 STEM 教师的态度来参与 STEM 领域。总体而言，这项研究有助于 STEM 教师的专业发展，并有助于满足日益多样化的学生群体的需求。本研究旨在探讨 STEM 如何进行。教师的意识STEM 教育的系统性和成长心态信念影响本科生在 STEM 中的成功，现有的定量研究尚未确定这些教师态度对他们参与文化相关教学法的独立贡献，以及由此产生的对 STEM 学生成绩的影响。该项目可以提供初步支持，表明对 STEM 教师态度的多个维度的分析对于解决代表性不足的学生成功的现有挑战至关重要。该项目分为三个阶段：1）STEM 教师完成在线实验调查，以检查他们是否具有系统性意识。偏见和成长心态会影响他们对学业困难、代表性不足的学生的因果归因 2) 从 STEM 大学入门课程招募教师和学生，在学期开始时（时间 1）完成一项调查，学生完成一项后续调查。调查结果旨在检查教师的态度是否影响学生的归属感、自我效能感以及对未来 STEM 成功的期望 3) 一项在线实验设计，用于检查实验操作是否存在。假设教师的态度将影响代表性不足的传统本科生的 STEM 兴趣、自我效能和课程成功，每项研究还将进行额外的分析，以探索教师和学生种族、性别、社会阶层和性取向的差异。这项研究可能对 STEM 教育产生重要影响，因为它阐明了教师对学业困难学生的因果归因的影响；以及学生对 STEM 的态度。通过强调个人​​和系统因素对本科生成功的关键作用来转变 STEM 教育研究。该项目由 STEM 教育博士后研究奖学金 (STEM Ed PRF) 计划资助，旨在增强研究知识、技能和实践STEM、STEM 教育、教育和相关学科的最新博士学位，以促进他们为从事基础和应用研究做好准备，从而增进该领域的知识。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的评估进行评估，被认为值得支持智力优点和更广泛的影响审查标准。