Developing the Processes and Potential to Engage Historically Underrepresented Communities in Public Participation in STEM Research Through Authentic and Impactful Collaboration

作为加强非正式环境中学习的总体战略的一部分，推进非正式STEM学习（AISL）项目资助了用于各种环境的创新研究、方法和资源。利用社区参与研究、以人为本的设计和发展性评估方法，该项目将共同创建一个国家社区科学项目，这是公众参与STEM研究（PPSR）或公民科学的一种形式。该项目旨在提高STEM的包容性和公平性，同时通过历史上代表性不足的社区和成熟学术机构的领导和参与，建设研究和科学能力。参与者将记录他们感知到的压力水平和与当地音景相关的幸福感。该项目将帮助参与者，特别是来自STEM中代表性不足和服务不足的社区的青年及其家庭，通过与他们生活相关的真实学习，与科学和自然联系起来。在移动应用程序的支持下，社区科学项目的参与者探索和绘制声景，以确定“过度噪音”和“噪音避难所”的区域。社区主导的成果传播将为其他社区组织采用社区科学项目提供信息。该项目是由15位社区领袖、康奈尔鸟类学实验室、亚特兰大都市农场、圣地亚哥的WorldBeat中心、明尼苏达州圣保罗的CLUES和宾夕法尼亚州阿伦敦的Camp Compass合作完成的。PPSR在吸引广大受众参与STEM学习和研究方面具有令人兴奋的潜力，特别是当项目真正由当地社区、科学家和教育工作者共同创建时。在该项目中采用基于社区的参与性研究方法，促进社区成员直接参与科学实践和学习的整合，从研究问题的发展、研究的设计到结果的分析、解释和传播。以人为本的设计很重要，因为它是解决人类社区面临的现实问题的一种既定的协作方法。在这个项目中，以人为本的设计将包括在灵感、构思和实施的解决问题阶段的技术。发展性评估将在项目生命周期内，就PPSR（一种非正式的STEM学习环境）中的公平性和包容性向项目团队提供持续的直接反馈。该项目将进一步加深对声景和噪音污染的认识和理解，使人们能够使用移动应用程序来绘制城市环境中的声景，并为噪音与幸福感的关系做出贡献。该项目将产生概念框架和实用资源（工具包），以指导今后以社区为基础的公私部门责任审查工作。该项目的结果将提高PPSR从业者在STEM中代表性不足的受众的公平性、多样性和包容性方面的知识、技能、态度和行为。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative research, approaches, and resources for use in a variety of settings. Using community-based participatory research, human-centered design, and developmental evaluation approaches, this project will co-create a national community science project, which is a form of Public Participation in STEM Research (PPSR) or citizen science. The project seeks to increase inclusion and equity in STEM, while building capacity in research and science through leadership and participation by both historically underrepresented communities and established academic institutions. Participants will record their levels of perceived stress and well-being in relation to their local soundscape. This project will help to connect participants, specifically youth and their families from communities underrepresented and underserved in STEM, with science and nature through learning that is authentic and relevant to their lives. With support of a mobile app, community science project participants explore and map soundscapes to identify areas of "excessive noise" as well as "noise refuges." Community-led dissemination of results will inform adoption of community science projects by other community-based organizations. The project is a collaboration involving fifteen community leaders, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Metro Atlanta Urban Farm in Atlanta, WorldBeat Center in San Diego, CLUES in St. Paul, MN, and Camp Compass in Allentown, PA.PPSR has exciting potential to engage broad audiences in STEM learning and research, particularly when projects are genuinely co-created by local communities, scientists, and educators. Using a community-based participatory research approach in the project fosters direct involvement from community members in integration of science practices and learning, from the development of the research questions, design of the study, to analysis, interpretation, and dissemination of results. Human-centered design is important as it is an established collaborative approach for addressing real-world problems facing human communities. In this project, human-centered design will include technology in the problem-solving phases of inspiration, ideation, and implementation. Developmental evaluation will provide on-going direct feedback to the project team over the project lifespan with respect to equity and inclusion in PPSR, an informal STEM learning environment. The project will further knowledge and understanding of soundscapes and noise pollution, enable use of mobile apps to map soundscapes in urban environments, and contribute to the relationship of noise to well-being.The project will produce conceptual frameworks and practical resources (toolkits) to guide future community-based PPSR efforts. Results from this project will advance knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors of PPSR practitioners regarding equity, diversity, and inclusion of underrepresented audiences in STEM.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.