CAREER: Investigating the Engineering Expansive Learning Spaces for Boys of Color

这个赠款项目调查的方式，非洲裔美国男性开发的身份和能力的工程实践。使用实践联系的身份的理论框架，该项目还探讨了非洲裔美国男性学生的参与，学习和身份形成的背景下，三个不同的工程学习环境：小学，中学和本科工程之间的复杂关系。该项目还涉及开发案例研究的学生参与工程设计实践中的每一个方面，并比较学生的经验跨上下文。研究结果可能会影响学校，特别是教育工作者，如何概念化下一代科学标准的做法，从而打开这些做法，以更多方面的方式谈论，思考，参与和突出这些设置中的身份工作的关键方面。该项目的优点在于继续需要进行研究，对工程专业学生的招聘和保留产生积极影响，特别是来自代表性不足的社区。通过关注非洲裔美国男性，该项目扩展了对他们可能发展工程实践能力和身份的方式的理解。此外，该项目很可能有助于工程教育界的工程身份的发展和不同的功能内的学习环境，促进这些身份的形成和转变的理解。项目的主要目标是开展以下研究和教育活动：（a）研究和描述非裔美国人男性的工程实践能力和身份之间的关系;（B）研究和描述工程学习环境中影响非裔美国人男性发展能力和身份的因素;（c）提出假设，设计广阔的工程学习空间，以提高非裔美国人男性的能力和身份。该项目在探索学生的工程参与，学习和身份形成之间的复杂关系的方法是独特的，以了解非洲裔美国男性在工程方面的广泛学习生态。工程教育中对公平学习空间设计的强调将提供更多的见解，可以更广泛地影响学术界。

This grant project investigates the ways in which African American males develop identities and competencies in engineering practices. Using a theoretical framework of practice-linked identities, the project also examines the complex relation between African American male students' engagement, learning, and identity formation in the context of three different engineering learning environments: elementary school, middle school, and undergraduate engineering. The project also involves developing case studies of students' engagement with engineering design practices within each context and comparing students' experiences across contexts. The findings are likely to influence how schools, especially educators, conceptualize Next Generation Science Standard practices, thus opening up these practices to more multifaceted ways of talking, thinking, and engaging and highlighting critical aspects of identity work in these settings. The merit of this project lies in the continued need for research that positively impacts the recruitment and retention of engineering students, particularly from underrepresented communities. By focusing on African American males, the project extends the understandings of the ways in which they may develop engineering practice competencies and identities. Further, the project is likely to contribute to the engineering education community's understanding of the development of engineering identities and the different features within learning environments that foster the formation and transformation of these identities. The key project objectives are the research and educational activities are the following:(a)examine and characterize the relationship between African American males' engineering practice competencies and identities; (b)examine and characterize elements within engineering learning environments that impact African American males' developing competencies and identities; and (c)develop hypotheses for the design of expansive engineering learning spaces for increasing African American males' competencies and identities. The project is unique in its approach to exploring the complex relationship between students' engineering engagement, learning, and identity formation to understand expansive learning ecologies in engineering for African American males. The strong emphasis on the design of equitable learning spaces within engineering education will provide additional insights that can more broadly impact the academic community.