INSPIRE Track 1: Primary School Organizations as Open Systems: Strategic External Relationship Development to Promote Student Engagement in STEM Topics

该INSPIRE奖的部分资金来自社会、行为和经济科学理事会社会和经济科学部的组织科学项目，以及教育和人力资源理事会学习研究部的数学和科学伙伴关系项目和发现研究K-12项目。我们的国家面临着学生参与度下降的问题，特别是在科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）学科和代表性不足的少数群体中。大多数情况下，这个问题是在成就差距的背景下讨论的，即种族和社会经济群体在学业评估中的表现不平等。为了理解是什么造成了成绩差距，研究人员必须了解不同背景的学生之间存在的STEM“机会差距”，这些学生由于不同的校外充实和学习经历而取得不同的成绩。STEM机会差距源于儿童校外学习经历的不平等。因此，只有当我们考虑到小学运作的复杂组织环境时，让少数民族和妇女参与小学STEM的努力才会成功。本研究的重点是学校需要维持什么样的组织间关系，以确保学生参与STEM的公平、高效和有效的机会。外部关系需要学校投入时间和资源，学校必须决定发展和维护哪些关系。了解特定类型的学校投资于什么样的关系，以及致力于维持这些关系的努力程度，对于提高学生参与STEM的机会非常重要。具体而言，该研究探讨了伊利诺伊州芝加哥市3个社区的9所学校的以下问题：(1)学校与外部社区的关系如何促进和限制学生参与STEM。(2)通过绘制网络，并评估创建、维持和解除网络关系的成本和收益，分析三个不同城市社区中不同类型学校之间伙伴关系（特别是stem相关伙伴关系）的异同。(3)如何使用运筹学框架对学校和网络的决策、关系和资源进行建模。该模型规定了解决战略、战术和运营问题的网络配置，以确保学校公平、高效和有效地利用合作伙伴来提高学生对STEM的参与度。

This INSPIRE award is partially funded by the Science of Organization Program in the Division of Social and Economic Sciences in the Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences Directorate, and the Math and Science Partnership Program and the Discovery Research K-12 program in the Division of Research on Learning in the Education and Human Resources Directorate. Our country faces a decline in student engagement, particularly in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) disciplines and among underrepresented minority groups. Most often this problem is discussed in the context of an achievement gap, where racial and socioeconomic groups perform unequally on academic assessments. To understand what creates the achievement gap, researchers must understand the STEM "opportunity gap" that exists between students from different backgrounds, where these same students achieve differently because of varying exposure to out-of-school enrichment and learning experiences. The STEM opportunity gap arises from the inequity of out-of-school learning experiences for children. Therefore, efforts to engage minorities and women in STEM in primary schools will only succeed if we consider the complex organizational environment in which primary schools operate. The focus of this study is on what interorganizational relationships are necessary for schools to maintain to ensure equitable, efficient, and effective opportunities for students to engage in STEM. External relationships require schools to commit time and resources, and schools must decide which relationships to develop and maintain. Understanding what kinds of relationships particular school types invest in and what level of effort to commit to maintaining those relationships is important for improving student engagement opportunities in STEM. Specifically, the study explores the following issues in 9 schools across 3 neighborhoods in Chicago, IL: (1) How student engagement in STEM is enabled and constrained by the school's relations with its external community. (2) The similarities and differences in partnerships, particularly STEM-related partnerships, across different types of schools in three different urban neighborhoods by mapping networks, and assessing the costs and benefits of creating, maintaining, and dissolving network ties. (3) How to model school and network decisions, relations, and resources using an operations research framework. The model prescribes network configurations that address strategic, tactical, and operational concerns, to ensure the school will equitably, efficiently, and effectively utilize partners to improve student engagement in STEM.