Zip to Industry: A First-Year Corporate-STEM Connection Program

“Zip to Industry”项目的重要性在于，它为研究工作阴影如何影响学生在大学第一年的STEM保留提供了一个机会。许多工程或STEM专业的大一学生对工程师或STEM专业毕业后的工作知之甚少。 该项目将确定学生谁可能有一个薄弱的连接到STEM职业进入后，并为他们提供在他们的第一年工作阴影的经验。 这些一年级的学生将获得这种探索经验的报酬，并且可以在STEM或工程职位中进行广泛或狭隘的选择。学生们将在合作教育或实习岗位上为阿克伦大学的学生提供影子。如果成功，该项目将在其他学院和大学推广，这有助于提高STEM领域学生的保留率。 可持续发展计划有两个方面：1）如果通过该项目达到了保留的结果目标，该机构将资助项目协调员职位来运行该计划，2）参与的区域行业合作伙伴同意成为一个财团的一部分，以支持资助一年级学生参加。该项目的目标是确定并招募2个50个STEM专业的学生。（共100名学生），探索他们对STEM职业的看法和知识，以及他们从事STEM职业的动机。学生将在第一年有10个工作阴影的经验。 学生将在前往工作地点之前接受相关专业发展技能的培训，并将有能力通过焦点小组讨论和个人反思来反思他们的经验。“Zip to Industry”项目的教育框架是社会认知职业理论，该理论提出，一个人的目标和实现这些目标的努力受到他们的兴趣、信心、成果预期和与目标相关的先前学习经历的影响。 工作阴影被认为是一种强大的学习经验，将影响知识和态度，对坚持职业目标至关重要。阿克伦大学拥有美国第五大合作教育项目，去年有1000多名学生参加了合作教育/实习项目。 有了这个广泛的雇主网络，该机制存在于UA，以检查工作影子计划对一年级STEM学生的影响，并提高STEM领域的保留率。

The importance of the "Zip to Industry" project is that it provides an opportunity for research on how job shadowing impacts student retention in STEM during the first year of college. Many freshman students in engineering or STEM majors have little understanding of what an engineer or STEM major does upon graduation. The project will identify students who may have a weak connection to STEM careers upon entering and provide them with job shadowing experiences during their first year. These first-year students will be paid for this exploration experience and can choose broadly or narrowly within STEM or engineering positions. The students will shadow current University of Akron students on co-operative education or internship placements. If successful, the project will be replicated at other colleges and universities, which can help increase the retention of students within STEM fields. Sustainability plans are twofold: 1) should outcome goals on retention be reached through the project, the institution will fund the project coordinator position to run the program and 2) participating regional industry partners agree to be part of a consortium to support funding of the first-year students to participate.The project's goal is to identify and recruit 2 cohorts of 50 STEM majors (totaling 100 students), explore their perceptions and knowledge of STEM careers, as well as their motivation for STEM careers. The students will have 10 job shadowing experiences during their first year. The students will be trained in relevant professional development skills prior to leaving for their job sites and will have the ability to reflect on their experiences through focus group discussions and individual reflection. The educational framework for the "Zip to Industry" project is Social Cognitive Career Theory, which proposes that a person's goals and efforts towards realizing those goals, are impacted by their interest, confidence, outcome expectations and prior learning experiences related to the goal. Job shadowing is conceived as a powerful learning experience that will impact knowledge and attitudes important for persistence toward a career goal. The University of Akron, which has the 5th oldest co-operative education program in the US, placed more than 1000 students in co-operative education/internship programs this past year. With this extensive employer network, the mechanism exists at UA to examine the impact of a job shadowing program on first-year STEM students and improve retention in STEM fields.