CAREER: Multidimensional Support to Improve Distance Learning Experience in Community College STEM Gateway Courses

在这个CAREER奖项中，调查员将记录社区大学在线STEM课程的教学实践，并促进在线教学的有效实践。这项工作意义重大，因为社区学院是每年数百万低收入和少数民族学生获得中学后STEM教育的关键点。因此，社区学院在国家STEM管道中发挥着关键作用。 不幸的是，社区学院面临着许多挑战，包括空间和师资的限制，以及很大一部分非传统的大学生很难参加校园课程。通过完全在线课程的远程学习是一种很有前途的方法，使大学能够提供额外的课程或课程部分，从而增加学生获得和通过必修课程的进展，以减轻这些障碍。该项目旨在通过循证干预战略和实践，促进社区学院STEM网关课程远程学习的有效性，最终目标是支持提高学生的参与度和表现。该项目有五个具体目标：（一）记录社区学院提供的STEM网关在线课程的典型教学方法;（二）确定有希望的干预战略，有可能更好地支持学生参与和学习完全在线的课程;（三）通过严格的随机对照试验评估这些战略对学生学习成果的影响;（iv）通过调查学习行为和干预策略可能影响这些行为的方式，了解学生在在线环境中的学习体验;（v）评估哪些干预策略可以减少来自弱势背景和弱势背景的学习者之间在在线课程中的表现差距。为实现这些目标，将开展两项核心研究。研究人员将实施和评估两个具体的干预策略，这些策略在四年的环境中显示出有希望的结果：技能支架和增加人际互动。一项描述性研究将系统地收集有关教师对远程学习的看法及其在大型州立社区学院系统的大量在线STEM网关课程中的教学实践的信息。随后，研究者将根据理论建议和从描述性研究中收集的信息制定额外的干预策略。干预研究将进行一系列随机分配实验。这些实验将评估战略的影响，以更有效地参与和支持学生在线STEM网关课程。这个奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并已被认为是值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估的支持。

In this CAREER award, the investigator will document teaching practices in online STEM courses at community colleges and promote effective practices for online teaching. This work is significant because community colleges are a key point of access to postsecondary STEM education for millions of low-income and ethnic minority students each year. Thus, community colleges play a critical role in the national STEM pipeline. Unfortunately, community colleges face many challenges, including space and faculty constraints and a large proportion of nontraditional college students who find it difficult to attend on-campus courses. Distance learning through fully online coursework is a promising approach to mitigating these barriers by enabling colleges to offer additional courses or course sections, thus increasing student access to and progression through required courses. This project aims to promote the effectiveness of distance learning in STEM gateway courses at community colleges through evidence-based intervention strategies and practices, with the ultimate goal of supporting improved student engagement and performance. The project has five specific objectives: (i) to document typical instructional approaches in online STEM gateway courses offered at community colleges; (ii) to identify promising intervention strategies with the potential to better support student engagement and learning in fully online coursework; iii) to evaluate the impacts of these strategies on student learning outcomes through rigorous randomized controlled trials; (iv) to understand the student experience of learning within online environments through investigation of learning behaviors and the ways in which an intervention strategy may influence these behaviors; and (v) to evaluate which intervention strategies reduce performance gaps in online courses between learners from less and more disadvantaged backgrounds. To achieve these objectives, two core studies will be conducted. The investigator will implement and evaluate two specific intervention strategies that have shown promising results in a four-year setting: skill scaffolding and increased interpersonal interaction. A descriptive study will systematically collect information on instructors' perceptions of distance learning and their instructional practices in a large swath of online STEM gateway courses in a large state community college system. Subsequently, the investigator will develop additional intervention strategies based on both theoretical recommendations and information collected from the descriptive study. An intervention study will conduct a series of random-assignment experiments. These experiments will assess the impacts of strategies for more effectively engaging and supporting students in online STEM gateway courses.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.