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.

智力优势：过去 20 年来，美国计算机和信息科学 (CIS) 专业的女性入学率以及 CIS 本科和研究生学位的完成率有所下降。由于缺乏对 CIS 专业进出途径（包括社区大学途径）的研究，扭转这一趋势的努力受到限制。社区学院之所以受到关注，是因为与四年制大学相比，社区学院吸引了更高比例的女性以及更广泛的年龄和社会经济地位的人口。 本研究旨在收集数据，通过探索社区大学中女性和男性学习编程入门课程的经历以及这些经历对他们攻读四年制 CIS 学位的决定的影响，为鼓励女性攻读 CIS 专业提供信息。该研究基于理论框架，该框架表明动机、父母和同伴支持以及以前的计算机使用（尤其是玩电脑游戏）的重要性。 研究人员将在社区学院招募 700 名男女学生学习编程入门课程，这些社区学院是加州大学（四年制公立大学）CIS 系的主要附属学校。 参与者将在两年内完成三项调查，并对子样本进行访谈。 更广泛的影响：该研究的结果将为关于 CIS 专业途径性别差异的三个广泛持有的假设提供急需的数据；最近的评论表明，关于社区大学 CIS 学生的动机、家庭支持和计算机使用（特别是数字游戏）的作用的实际研究很少。现有的数据是在广泛使用的移动设备（例如手机）和多人互联网游戏出现之前收集的，缺乏理论，没有检查性别内的变化，并且缺乏允许因果推理或确定效应大小的设计或分析方法。这项研究将克服这些限制，并提供有关学生选择入门编程课程的原因以及这些影响因素与在四年制院校学习 CIS 的决定有何关系的数据。此外，这项研究将有助于了解数字游戏在 CIS 专业选择中的作用，因为之前的研究重点是玩游戏的频率而不是玩游戏的类型。这项研究将为增加四年制大学攻读 CIS 专业的学生数量提供信息。过去五年，这些专业的入学人数有所下降，尤其是女性。 但由于缺乏对学生的严格研究，缩小性别差距的努力受到了限制？进入和完成社区大学的途径；对于 CIS 学生转学到四年制院校的原因，人们知之甚少。本研究旨在通过确定参加入门编程课程的学生的特征和先前经验，以及这些特征和当前在 CIS 课程中的经验是否预示着他们打算继续在四年制大学攻读 CIS 专业，来填补这一空白。