RDE-FRI: Improving Access to STEM for Community College Students with Disabilities in Universally Designed Learning Communities

RDE-FRI项目：改善在通用设计的学习社区中残疾社区大学生获得STEM的机会，是一个为期36个月、价值30万美元的项目，由残疾教育研究（RDE）项目的重点研究倡议（FRI）项目资助。该项目的主要目标是为社区大学的科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）领域的残疾学生创建和测试学生学习社区模式的有效性。在NSF （HRD-0004326, DRL-0618182）和美国教育部（P333A020021）资助的早期工作的基础上，这个经验丰富的项目团队将残疾学生安置在Springfield技术社区学院，Greenfield社区学院和Quinsigamond社区学院的通用设计的STEM学习社区（UDLC）中，以研究UDLC对学生学习成绩，保留和信心的影响。UDLCs包括一组学生，他们参加了STEM特定的大学成功课程和STEM学术课程。在这个项目的三(3)年中，将有大约65名残疾学生和510名非残疾学生组成两个对照组，对照组受试者将与大约50名残疾学生和65名非残疾学生进行比较，这些学生将作为实验组的一部分接受UDLC干预。该项目解决了FRI跟踪目标之一：调查STEM中残疾人的有效教学方法和实践。该项目包括由麻省大学多纳休研究所的一个团队进行的形成性和总结性项目评估过程，以及创建和出版“最佳实践电子STEM研究和学习指南”和“开发UDL STEM大学成功课程指南”的计划。项目团队正在利用其他项目的资源，包括nsf资助的国家电信技术中心（DUE-0302548）和rde资助的南缅因大学东部地区联盟（HRD-0333316），提供基于网络的资源，将通用设计学习应用于社区大学的STEM课程，使残疾学生能够充分参与STEM教育。

The project RDE-FRI: Improving Access to STEM for Community College Students with Disabilities in Universally Designed Learning Communities is a 36-month, $300,000 dollar award funded by the Research in Disabilities Education (RDE) program''s Focused Research Initiatives (FRI) track. The primary goal of this project is to create and test the effectiveness of a student learning community model for community college students with disabilities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). Building on earlier work funded by NSF (HRD-0004326, DRL-0618182) and the U.S. Education Department (P333A020021) this experienced project team is placing students with disabilities in a universally designed STEM learning community (UDLC) at Springfield Technical Community College, Greenfield Community College and Quinsigamond Community College, in order to study the impact of the UDLC on student academic performance, retention and confidence to be successful in STEM. The UDLCs include a group of students who are enrolled in a STEM-specific college success course and a STEM academic course. Over the three (3) years of this project there will be approximately 65 students with disabilities and 510 students without disabilities in two control groups, and a comparison will be made between the control group subjects and approximately 50 students with disabilities and 65 students without disabilities who will receive the UDLC intervention as part of their experimental group status. The project addresses one (1) of the FRI track goals: To investigate effective instructional methods and practices for people with disabilities in STEM. The project includes a formative and summative project evaluation process conducted by a team from the University of Massachusetts''s Donahue Institute, as well as plans to create and publish the "Best Practices Electronic STEM Study and Learning Guidebook" and the "Guide for Developing a UDL STEM College Success Course." The project team is leveraging resources with other projects, including the NSF-funded National Center for Telecommunications Technologies (DUE-0302548) and the RDE-funded EAST Regional Alliance at the University of Southern Maine (HRD-0333316), to provide web-based resources for applying universal design learning to community college STEM courses so that students with disabilities can fully participate in STEM education.