Collaborative Research: How Military Service Shapes STEM Trajectories

合作研究：兵役如何塑造 STEM 轨迹

• 批准号: 1728044
• 负责人: Christina Steidl
• 金额: $ 5.43万
• 依托单位: University of Alabama in Huntsville
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2017
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2017-09-01 至 2020-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1728044&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; How; Military; Service

The project will advance scientists' understanding of STEM career trajectories by exploring the historical and contemporary role of the U.S. military as a potential career pathway. Specifically, the project analyzes the impact of educational benefits associated with military service (GI Bill), plus the role of individual and workplace factors on people's educational and occupational outcomes. Thus, the project addresses recurrent calls from the Federal Government and National Academy of Sciences to increase the number of STEM professionals, diversify the STEM workforce, and optimize the recruitment of military personnel. Findings from this project will help social scientists identify the long-term effects of policies and workplace dynamics on degrees and occupations. Findings will promote national defense and our ability to train the next generation of STEM scientists, because employers (from Departments of Defense and Commerce, Veterans Administration, to private-sector) are interested in hiring individuals with a military background, many of whom are poised to work in technical/defense fields and classified environments. Findings also will inform efforts to broaden STEM participation and identify potentially unanticipated consequences of federal policies designed to broaden access to higher education.The project addresses the following questions central to scientific literatures on education and occupations: How does military service and the educational benefits associated with it shape individuals? subsequent training and employment in STEM fields? How have era of service and changing GI Bill benefits affected STEM trajectories among veterans? How do organizational factors associated with specific military branches facilitate entry into STEM fields? How does using competing definitions of STEM fields employed by federal agencies affect the form and magnitude of the above patterns? To answer these questions, the project employs statistical analysis of publically available secondary data from the American Community Survey (ACS) and Department of Defense Demographic Reports. The result will be a newly merged public-use data set available to researchers that combines Census data with organizational data on the armed services. Analyses involve sophisticated statistical models on large samples: For instance, analyses of occupational trajectories include more than 5 million ACS respondents, including more than 700k veterans. ACS data also facilitate analysis of educational and occupational patterns among active-duty military personnel, who potentially constitute a prime target population for recruitment into STEM fields. The project also makes a methodological contribution by examining how various, competing ways to operationalize and measure "STEM" used by federal agencies shape conclusions about the scope and extent of the much-discussed shortage of STEM workers.

该项目将通过探索美国军队作为潜在职业途径的历史和当代作用，促进科学家对STEM职业轨迹的理解。具体而言，该项目分析了与兵役（GI法案）相关的教育福利的影响，以及个人和工作场所因素对人们的教育和职业成果的作用。因此，该项目解决了联邦政府和国家科学院不断发出的呼吁，即增加STEM专业人员的数量，使STEM劳动力多样化，并优化军事人员的招募。该项目的研究结果将帮助社会科学家确定政策和工作场所动态对学位和职业的长期影响。调查结果将促进国防和我们培养下一代STEM科学家的能力，因为雇主（从国防部和商务部，退伍军人管理局到私营部门）有兴趣雇用具有军事背景的个人，其中许多人准备在技术/国防领域和机密环境中工作。调查结果还将通知努力扩大干参与和确定潜在的意想不到的后果联邦政策，旨在扩大高等教育的机会。该项目解决了以下问题的核心科学文献的教育和职业：如何兵役和教育福利与它塑造个人？在STEM领域的后续培训和就业？服务时代和不断变化的GI法案福利如何影响退伍军人的STEM轨迹？与特定军事部门相关的组织因素如何促进进入STEM领域？联邦机构对STEM领域的竞争性定义如何影响上述模式的形式和规模？ 为了回答这些问题，该项目采用了统计分析，从美国社区调查（ACS）和国防部人口统计报告中获得的二手数据。其结果将是一个新合并的公共使用数据集，可供研究人员使用，该数据集将人口普查数据与武装部队的组织数据相结合。分析涉及大样本的复杂统计模型：例如，职业轨迹分析包括500多万ACS受访者，其中包括70多万退伍军人。ACS的数据还有助于分析现役军人的教育和职业模式，他们可能是STEM领域招聘的主要目标人群。该项目还通过研究各种相互竞争的方式来操作和衡量联邦机构使用的“STEM”，从而对备受讨论的STEM工人短缺的范围和程度得出结论，从而在方法上做出贡献。

项目成果

If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail: Operationalization matters

如果你只有一把锤子，那么一切看起来都像钉子：可操作性很重要

• DOI: 10.1111/soc4.12727
• 发表时间: 2019
• 期刊: Sociology Compass
• 影响因子: 2.7
• 作者: Steidl, Christina R.;Werum, Regina
• 通讯作者: Werum, Regina

Military service and STEM employment: Do veterans have an advantage?

服兵役和 STEM 就业：退伍军人有优势吗？

• DOI: 10.1016/j.ssresearch.2020.102478
• 发表时间: 2020
• 期刊: Social Science Research
• 影响因子: 2.5
• 作者: Werum, Regina;Steidl, Christina;Harcey, Sela;Absalon, Jacob
• 通讯作者: Absalon, Jacob

Soldiers to Scientists: Military Service, Gender, and STEM Degree Earning

从士兵到科学家：兵役、性别和 STEM 学位获得

• DOI: 10.1177/2378023120948713
• 发表时间: 2020
• 期刊: Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World
• 作者: Steidl, Christina;Werum, Regina;Harcey, Sela;Absalon, Jacob;MillerMacPhee, Alice
• 通讯作者: MillerMacPhee, Alice