Promoting Undergraduate STEM Retention through Self-Efficacy

在国家科学基金会科学、技术、工程和数学奖学金（S-STEM）项目的资助下，卡罗尔大学亲STEM倡议：通过自我效能促进STEM保留，将为具有经济需求和学术承诺的低收入学生提供支持，帮助他们在卡罗尔大学的STEM学科取得成功。该项目将在五年内为攻读应用物理、生物化学、化学、计算机科学和数学学士学位的学生提供128个奖学金。为了促进这些STEM专业的学业成功和保留率，该项目将：(1)将自我效能感建设策略纳入卡罗尔大学文科课程的通识教育课程，(2)通过由目标领域的一年级课程教授组成的教师专业学习社区促进对项目目标的支持，以及(3)使用同伴领导的学习小组和社区建设活动来支持自我效能感和保留率。本项目将把促进自我效能发展的重点教学纳入一年级学生的基础通识教育课程。它将检查该指令是否提高了目标STEM专业的持久性，如果是的话，它是如何做到的。本项目以自我效能感研究为基础，运用思维习惯策略和实践（如坚持、灵活思考、元认知、力求准确、质疑和提出问题）帮助学生建立学术技能和自我意识。该项目的活动有助于建立有关STEM保留和学生学业成功的知识库。结果将进一步作为一个模式，帮助其他小型学校提高完成率，并有效地为学生在大学毕业后的成功做好准备。

With funding from the National Science Foundation's Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (S-STEM) program, the Carroll University Pro-STEM Initiative: Promoting STEM Retention through Self-Efficacy will provide support to low-income students with demonstrated financial need and academic promise to succeed in STEM disciplines at Carroll University. The project will fund 128 scholarships over five years for students who are pursuing bachelor's degrees in applied physics, biochemistry, chemistry, computer science, and mathematics. To promote academic success and retention within these STEM majors, the program will: (1) incorporate self-efficacy building strategies in general education courses of Carroll University's liberal arts curriculum, (2) foster support of project goals through a faculty professional learning community populated by those who teach first-year courses in the targeted fields, and (3) use peer-led study groups and community building activities that support self-efficacy and retention.This project will integrate focused instruction that promotes self-efficacy development into foundational general education courses for first year students. It will examine whether or not this instruction improves persistence in the targeted STEM majors, and if so how it does so. Building on self-efficacy research, this project applies Habits of Mind strategies and practices (e.g., persisting, thinking flexibly metacognition, striving for accuracy, and questioning and posing problems) to help students build academic skills and self-awareness. Activities of the project contribute to the knowledge base on STEM retention and student academic success. The results will further serve as a model to aid other small schools in increasing completion rates and effectively preparing students for success beyond college.