GSE/RES: Students' Pathways into Computer and Information Sciences Majors:A Study of Community College Men and Women

GSE/RES：学生进入计算机和信息科学专业的途径：对社区大学男女的研究

• 批准号: 0936791
• 负责人: Jill Denner
• 金额: $ 50万
• 依托单位: ETR Associates
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-01-01 至 2013-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0936791&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: GSE; RES; Students; Pathways; into

Intellectual Merit: Women's enrollment in computer and information sciences (CIS) majors and completion of CIS undergraduate and graduate degrees has declined in the US over the last 20 years. Efforts to reverse this trend have been limited by a lack of research on the pathways into and out of CIS majors, including community college pathways. Community colleges are of interest because they attract a higher proportion of females and a broader demographic in terms of age and socioeconomic status than 4-year universities. This study is designed to collect data that can be used to inform efforts to encourage women to pursue CIS majors by exploring the experiences of women and men in community colleges taking introductory programming courses and the impact of those experiences on their decisions to pursue a four-year CIS degree. The study is based on theoretical frameworks that suggest the importance of motivation, parent and peer support, and previous computer use, especially computer game play. The researchers will recruit 700 female and male students in introductory programming courses at community colleges that are key feeder schools to the University of California (4-year public universities) CIS departments. Participants will complete three surveys over two years, and a subsample will be interviewed.Broader Impacts: The findings of the study will provide much-needed data on three widely held assumptions about gender differences in pathways to CIS majors; recent reviews suggest that there is little actual research on the role of motivation, family support and computer use (particularly digital gaming) among community college CIS students. That which exists was collected before the availability of widely accessible mobile (e.g., cell phone) and multiplayer Internet games, is short on theory, does not examine variation within gender, and lacks a design or analytic approach that allows for causal inference or the determination of effect sizes. This study will overcome these limitations and provide data on why students choose introductory programming courses and how those influential factors relate to decisions to pursue CIS at a 4-year institution. In addition, this study will contribute to knowledge about the role of digital gaming in choice of CIS major, since prior research focuses on frequency of game play rather than on type of play. This research will inform efforts to increase the number of students who pursue CIS majors at 4-year universities. Enrollment in these majors has dropped in the last five years, especially for women. But efforts to close the gender gap have been limited by a lack of rigorous research on students? pathways into and through community college; little is known about why CIS students transfer to 4-year institutions. This research aims to fill this gap by identifying the characteristics and prior experience of students who take introductory programming courses, and whether those characteristics and current experience in CIS courses predict intention to go on to pursue a CIS major at a 4-year university.

知识分子的优点：在过去的20年中，美国的妇女入学计算机和信息科学（CIS）专业和CIS本科和研究生学位的完成。扭转这一趋势的努力受到缺乏对CIS专业（包括社区大学途径）的途径的研究的限制。社区大学之所以引起人们的关注，是因为它们吸引了比4年大学的年龄和社会经济地位相比，在年龄和社会经济地位方面吸引了更高的女性和更广泛的人口。 这项研究旨在收集可用于鼓励妇女努力的数据，以探索在社区大学中男女的经历，参加介绍性编程课程，以及这些经验对他们的决定的影响，以攻读四年的CIS学位。该研究基于理论框架，这些框架表明动机，父母和同伴支持以及以前的计算机使用，尤其是计算机游戏的重要性。 研究人员将在社区大学的入门编程课程中招募700名女学生，这些课程是加利福尼亚大学（4年公立大学）CIS系的关键喂食者学校。 参与者将在两年内完成三项调查，并将采访一个子样本。Broader的影响：该研究的结果将提供有关三个广泛持有的关于在CIS专业途径中性别差异的假设的急需数据；最近的评论表明，关于社区大学CIS学生中动机，家庭支持和计算机使用（尤其是数字游戏）的作用的实际研究很少。在广泛访问的移动设备（例如手机）和多人互联网游戏的可用性之前收集了这些存在的内容，理论上是简短的，无法检查性别内的差异，并且缺乏允许因果推理或确定效果大小的设计或分析方法。这项研究将克服这些局限性，并提供有关学生为什么选择入门编程课程以及这些影响因素如何与在4年机构进行CIS的决策相关的数据。此外，这项研究将有助于了解数字游戏在选择CIS Major中的作用，因为先前的研究重点是游戏的频率，而不是游戏类型。这项研究将为增加在4年大学攻读CIS专业的学生的努力。在过去的五年中，这些专业的入学人数下降了，尤其是对于女性而言。 但是，由于缺乏对学生的严格研究而限制了缩小性别差距的努力？进入社区学院的途径；关于为什么独联体学生转移到4年的机构，知之甚少。这项研究旨在通过确定参加介绍性编程课程的学生的特征和先前经验来填补这一空白，以及这些特征和当前在CIS课程中的特征和当前经验预测，有意继续在一所4年的大学中攻读CIS专业。