Exploratory: Life STEM: Promoting STEM Career Awareness, Engagement, and Identity, via a Culturally Relevant and Technology-Infused STEM-Based Curriculum

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This project will advance efforts of the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program to better understand and promote practices that increase students' motivations and capacities to pursue careers in fields of science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) by engaging in hands-on field experience, laboratory/project-based entrepreneurship tasks and mentorship experiences.The NSF ITEST program supports research on the design, development, implementation, and selective spread of innovative strategies for engaging students in technology-rich experiences.This Innovative Technology Experience for Students and Teachers project will expose underrepresented minority (URM) 3rd-5th grade students to a range of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) careers, and promote positive STEM identities by piloting a novel STEM Academy infused with technology and culturally relevant STEM career-based modules. This 2-year exploratory project will develop a sustainable program to engage URM students, make them aware of STEM careers, and motivate them to consider educational pathways to STEM careers. This project will create training and mentoring opportunities for students, teachers, and families through a partnership between a minority-serving institution and elementary schools that are federally designated as low-performing focus or priority schools. The project will also advance knowledge related to educational, psychosocial, and family factors that may determine whether URM students persist in the STEM education-to-career pipeline. This project will enhance 3rd-5th grade STEM curricula by developing and implementing culturally relevant and responsive modules. The project will explore factors influencing URM students' learning and efficacy in STEM, while developing a platform for teachers to better understand socio-cultural and environmental impacts on URM students' engagement in STEM and interest in STEM careers. The four major goals are as follows: 1) develop an effective partnership that promotes a collaborative and synergistic STEM Learning Ecosystem between teachers, students, parents/families and STEM career partners; 2) utilize best practices to create an intentional, stakeholder-vetted, culturally relevant, and technology-rich STEM Academy geared toward promoting STEM occupational awareness; 3) develop a reflective capstone project that encourages application of ideas, skills, and knowledge gained during the Academy, and 4) develop purposeful mechanisms and utilize innovative technologies to bridge the gap between at-school and at-home learning. The project goals will be evaluated utilizing a mixed methods design including surveys, the Draw-a-Scientist Test (DAST), the capstone project, and feedback from focus groups. These data sources will elucidate the impact of the technology-infused culturally relevant pedagogical interventions on STEM career knowledge, science/scientist identity, and STEM self-efficacy. Hence, the project will engage both students and stakeholders while focusing specifically on building students' STEM identities via a STEM AcademyThis 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.