The Role of Academic Achievement and Social Inclusion in Broadening STEM Participation: Intended and Actual Attainment at the Intersection of Gender and Race/Ethnicity

本研究对科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）教育差异的文献做出了重大贡献，为不同种族/民族群体的男孩和女孩从中学到大学毕业的STEM发展轨迹提供了新的信息。德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校的研究人员将使用五个全面、大规模和纵向的数据集，研究子群体之间在预期和实际STEM成就方面的差异，并研究学术成就和社会包容的模式如何导致这些差异。五个数据集中的三个是具有全国代表性的样本，而另外两个是在德克萨斯州收集的，其中包括大量西班牙裔学生的样本。这五个数据集分别提供了检验某些独特的学术成就和社会包容指标的机会；总的来说，它们提供了从六年级到大学毕业，在种族/民族和性别交叉点调查STEM轨迹的机会。将特别注意少数民族女孩/妇女和少数民族男孩/男子的经验，以便更全面和比较地了解当代不平等的格局。该分析主要集中在两个研究目标上：1)研究学业成就和社会包容如何影响性别和种族/族裔亚群体在初中和高中期间的STEM预期成就差异；2)研究学业成就和社会包容如何影响性别和种族/族裔亚群体在大学期间的实际STEM成就差异。统计分析包括使用逻辑和多项逻辑回归模型和多级模型来检查学校或课堂水平的影响。期望的STEM成就是通过对有关期望职业的各种调查问题的答案以及与非STEM职业的相对偏好进行比较来衡量的。学术成就是通过成绩、考试成绩和课程学习来衡量的。社会包容是通过回答关于感知同伴和老师支持以及感知公平待遇的问题来衡量的。该研究的框架建立在交叉性理论的基础上，该理论关注性别和种族/民族的交叉点，以及当一个人同时属于两个地位相对较低的不同群体时可能出现的多重危险。该分析使用大规模数据来明确地处理不同群体的经历，并揭示可能确认这种危险的模式，或识别学生在教育环境中取得成功时的弹性实例。该项目的最终目标是通过提供有关促进或阻碍妇女和少数民族青年在STEM领域保留和取得成就的因素的新知识，扩大STEM参与。研究结果将在学术和政策相关会议上提出，在教育和社会学的顶级同行评议期刊上发表，并通过新闻稿向地方和国家媒体分发，以使公众广泛了解。研究团队还将利用其与国家教师专业发展计划的现有关系，将研究成果传达给全国中小学教师的主要受众。此外，该项目正在努力通过招募和培训STEM教育和社会学领域的女性和少数民族博士生来扩大参与。这些学生的不同观点，加上他们将接受的严格分析训练，对于培养未来几代学术研究人员研究STEM平等至关重要。

This study makes a major contribution to the literature on disparities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education by providing new information about the STEM trajectories of boys and girls from various racial/ethnic subgroups from middle school through the end of college. Using five comprehensive, large-scale and longitudinal datasets, researchers from the University of Texas at Austin will examine differences between subgroups in intended as well as actual STEM attainment and investigate how patterns of academic achievement and social inclusion contribute to those differences. Three of the five datasets are nationally representative samples while the other two were collected in Texas and include large sample populations of Hispanic students. Separately the five datasets provide the opportunity to examine certain unique measures of academic achievement and social inclusion; collectively they provide the chance to investigate STEM trajectories at the intersection of race/ethnicity and gender from the 6th grade to the end of college. Special attention will be paid to the experiences of minority girls/women and minority boys/men to gain a more comprehensive and comparative picture of contemporary patterns of inequality.The analysis focuses on two research aims: 1) to examine how academic achievement and social inclusion contribute to differences in intended STEM attainment during middle and high school by gender and racial/ethnic subgroup; and 2) to examine how academic achievement and social inclusion contribute to differences in actual STEM attainment during college by gender and racial/ethnic subgroup. Statistical analyses include models using logistic and multinomial logistic regression and multi-level models to examine school or classroom level effects. Intended STEM attainment is measured using the answers to various survey questions about desired occupation and comparing the relative preferences with non-STEM occupations. Academic achievement is measured using grades, test scores and course-taking. Social inclusion is measured using answers to questions about perceived peer and teacher support and perceived equitable treatment. The framework of the study is grounded in theories of intersectionality that focus on the intersection of gender and race/ethnicity and the multiple jeopardy that may apply when one is a member of two different groups with relatively lower status. This analysis uses large-scale data to explicitly address the experiences of different groups and to uncover patterns that may affirm this jeopardy or identify instances of resiliency when students succeed in educational environments.The ultimate goal of the project is to broaden STEM participation by contributing new knowledge about the factors that promote or impede the retention and attainment of women and minority youth in STEM fields. Findings will be presented at academic and policy-related conferences, published in top-tier peer-reviewed journals in education and sociology, and distributed through press releases to local and national media outlets to reach a broad public audience. The research team will also use their extant relationships with national teacher professional development programs to communicate research findings to key audiences of primary and secondary teachers across the country. Additionally, the project is working to broaden participation through the recruitment and training of women and minority doctoral students in the fields of STEM education and sociology. The diverse perspectives of these students, coupled with the rigorous analytical training they will receive, are critical for preparing future generations of academic researchers to study STEM equality.