Evaluation of the Sustainability and Effectiveness of Inquiry-Based Advanced Placement Science Courses: Evidence from an In-Depth Formative Evaluation & Randomized Controlled S

基于探究的科学先修课程可持续性和有效性的评估：来自深入形成性评估的证据

• 批准号: 1220092
• 负责人: Mark Long
• 金额: $ 261.68万
• 依托单位: University of Washington
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2012
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2012-09-15 至 2017-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1220092&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Evaluation; Sustainability; Effectiveness; Inquiry; Based

This study examines the impact of the newly revised Advanced Placement (AP) Biology and Chemistry courses on students' understanding of and ability to apply scientific inquiry, on students' confidence in successfully engaging in college-level material, and on students? enrollment and persistence in college STEM majors. AP Biology and Chemistry courses represent an important educational program that operates at a large scale across the country. The extent to which the AP curricula vary in implementation across the schools in the study is also examined to determine the range of students' opportunity to learn the disciplinary content and the knowledge and skills necessary to engage in inquiry in science. Schools that are newly implementing AP courses are participants in this research and the challenges and successes that they experience are also a component of the research plan. Researchers at the University of Washington, George Washington University and SRI International are conducting the study.The research design for this study includes both formative components and a randomized control experiment. Formative elements include observations, interviews and surveys of teachers and students in the AP courses studied. The experimental design includes the random assignment of students to the AP offered and follows the performances of the treatment and control students in two cohorts into their matriculation into postsecondary educational experiences. Surveys measure students' experiences in the AP courses, their motivations to study AP science, the level of stress they experience in their high school coursework and their scientific inquiry skills and depth of disciplinary knowledge. The study examines the majors chosen by those students who enter into colleges and universities to ascertain the extent to which they continue in science and engineering.This project informs educators about the challenges and successes schools encounter when they expand access to AP courses. The experiences of the teachers who will be teaching students with variable preparation inform future needs for professional development and support. The project provides estimates of the impact of students' AP-course taking on their progress into postsecondary educational experiences and their intent to continue to prepare to be future engineers and scientists. It informs policy efforts to improve the access to more rigorous advanced courses in STEM and provides strong experimental evidence of the impact of AP course taking. The project has the potential to demonstrate to educational researchers how to study an educational program that operates at scale.

本研究探讨了新修订的大学先修课程（AP）生物和化学课程对学生的理解和应用科学探究的能力，对学生的信心，成功地从事大学水平的材料，并对学生的影响？大学STEM专业的入学率和坚持率。AP生物学和化学课程是一个重要的教育计划，在全国范围内大规模运作。AP课程在研究中的学校实施的程度不同，以确定学生学习学科内容的机会范围，以及从事科学探究所需的知识和技能。新实施AP课程的学校是这项研究的参与者，他们所经历的挑战和成功也是研究计划的一部分。华盛顿大学、乔治华盛顿大学和SRI国际的研究人员正在进行这项研究，这项研究的研究设计包括形成性成分和随机对照实验。形成要素包括观察，访谈和调查的教师和学生在AP课程的研究。实验设计包括随机分配的AP提供的学生，并遵循两个队列中的治疗和对照组学生的表现进入他们的预科到中学后的教育经验。调查衡量学生在AP课程中的经验，他们学习AP科学的动机，他们在高中课程中经历的压力水平，以及他们的科学探究技能和学科知识的深度。该研究调查了进入学院和大学的学生所选择的专业，以确定他们在科学和工程方面的持续程度。该项目向教育工作者介绍了学校在扩大AP课程时遇到的挑战和成功。教师的经验，谁将教学生与变量准备通知未来的专业发展和支持的需求。该项目提供了学生的AP课程对他们进入中学后教育经历的影响的估计，以及他们继续准备成为未来的工程师和科学家的意图。它为政策努力提供信息，以改善获得更严格的STEM高级课程的机会，并为AP课程的影响提供了强有力的实验证据。 该项目有可能向教育研究人员展示如何研究大规模运作的教育计划。