EAGER: Understanding and Improving Collegiate Persistence and STEM Opportunities for Developmental Mathematics Students

在全国范围内，大约一半进入大学的学生被安排参加发展数学课程，这些课程侧重于基本的算术和预代数主题。此外，发展数学课程的学分通常不计入大学毕业时数。一些选择发展数学专业的本科生有兴趣从事STEM领域的职业，但由于他们必须从发展课程层面开始他们的学位轨迹，因此感到沮丧。与此同时，对科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）领域强大劳动力的持续需求，使得不要失去这么多对STEM感兴趣的学生变得非常重要。2015年秋季，西弗吉尼亚大学（WVU）的发展性数学课程将首次纳入学分权重，为研究这一变化对学生在课程中的成功以及在后续STEM课程中的坚持性的影响提供了一个特殊的机会。基于WVU目前在STEM学科中开展的基于学科自我同一性的早期研究的工作，该项目将解决以下问题：(1)发展数学的学生以何种方式自我认同为STEM学习者？(2)打算学习STEM的发展数学学生坚持攻读STEM学位的比例是多少？(3)向计分版发展数学的转变是否提高了学生的成功率？(4)发展数学中哪些因素有助于(i)作为STEM专业的坚持和（ii）作为STEM学习者的自我认同？(5)引入同伴导师对发展性学生的学习收益有何影响？利用调查和机构数据，项目团队将通过学位课程的前两年跟踪学生，调查发展数学学生何时以及为什么从STEM专业转出，并从这个补救起点确定与学生坚持STEM相关的因素。

Nationally, approximately half of all students entering college are placed into developmental mathematics courses, which focus on basic arithmetic and pre-algebra topics. In addition, often, the credit hours for developmental mathematics courses do not count toward college graduation hours. Some undergraduates who place into developmental mathematics are interested in pursuing a career in STEM, but get discouraged because they had to start their degree trajectory at the developmental course level. At the same time, the ongoing need for a strong workforce in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) makes it important not to lose so many students who started college with an interest in STEM. In Fall 2015, for the first time, the developmental mathematics course at West Virginia University (WVU) will carry credit-bearing weight, offering a special opportunity to study the impact of this change on student success in the course and persistence in subsequent STEM courses.Building on current work being conducted at WVU across STEM disciplines based on early studies of self-identity situated in disciplines, this project will address the following questions: (1) In what ways do students in developmental mathematics self-identify as STEM learners? (2) At what rate do STEM-intending developmental mathematics students persist in pursuit of a STEM degree? (3) Does a shift to a credit-bearing version of developmental mathematics improve student success rates? (4) What are the factors in developmental mathematics that contribute to (i) persistence as a STEM major and (ii) self identification as STEM learners? (5) How will the introduction of peer mentors affect the learning gains of developmental students? Using survey and institutional data, the project team will track students through their first two years of their degree programs to investigate when and why developmental mathematics students switch out of STEM majors, as well as to identify factors related to student persistence in STEM from this remedial starting point.