Financial, Academic, Social, and Mental Health Supports to Improve STEM Undergraduate Student Retention and Graduation

提供财务、学术、社会和心理健康支持，以提高 STEM 本科生的保留率和毕业率

• 批准号: 2030533
• 负责人: Rickey Caldwell Jr
• 金额: $ 99.95万
• 依托单位: Merrimack College
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-08-15 至 2025-07-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2030533&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Financial; Academic; Social; Mental; Health

This project will contribute to the national need for well-educated scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students with demonstrated financial need. Specifically, this project at Merrimack College in North Andover Massachusetts will provide 20 students with four years of scholarship support and specialized support services with the goal of recruiting, retaining, and graduating students with a four-year STEM degree. Students will progress through the program in three cohorts, two of seven students beginning in the first and second years, and a third of six students beginning in the third year. Research questions will explore the complex interactions among financial, social, emotional, and mental health factors and their influences on STEM undergraduate student retention and academic success. A novel element of the proposed program is the inclusion of a mental health professional as part of the program team to provide wellness resources for students.The project’s research goals are to quantify student grit, resilience, and other factors over the course of the program and will use statistical analysis to probe the interactions between these factors and student success. The Scholars will participate in group programming designed to improve their resilience, connection to the STEM field, and academic skills. The investigators will use multiple statistical analyses, including repeated measures with a within-between interaction, as well as qualitative assessments to test the hypothesis that the Scholars will evidence greater psychological resiliency and academic achievement outcomes relative to a) themselves over time and b) their matched controls. Additionally, regression analyses will be used to assess what variables are most predictive of student academic performance and structural equation modeling will allow for the current project to assess the underlying theoretical model of the relationships between variables. This project is funded by NSF’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, which seeks to increase the number of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need who earn degrees in STEM fields. It also aims to improve the education of future STEM workers, and to generate knowledge about academic success, retention, transfer, graduation, and academic/career pathways of low-income students.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.

该项目将通过支持有经济需要的高成就低收入学生的保留和毕业，促进国家对受过良好教育的科学家，数学家，工程师和技术人员的需求。具体来说，该项目在北安多弗马萨诸塞州的梅里马克学院将为20名学生提供为期四年的奖学金支持和专门的支持服务，目标是招募，保留和毕业学生四年STEM学位。学生将通过该计划在三个队列，两个七名学生开始在第一和第二年，和三分之一的六名学生开始在第三年的进展。研究问题将探讨财务，社会，情感和心理健康因素之间的复杂相互作用及其对STEM本科学生保留和学术成功的影响。该计划的一个新元素是将一名心理健康专业人员纳入计划团队，为学生提供健康资源。该项目的研究目标是量化学生在计划过程中的毅力，韧性和其他因素，并将使用统计分析来探索这些因素与学生成功之间的相互作用。学者将参加旨在提高他们的弹性，连接到STEM领域和学术技能的团体编程。研究人员将使用多种统计分析，包括重复测量与之间的相互作用，以及定性评估，以检验假设，即学者将证明更大的心理弹性和学术成就结果相对于a）随着时间的推移，他们自己和B）他们的匹配对照。此外，回归分析将用于评估哪些变量最能预测学生的学习成绩，结构方程模型将允许当前项目评估变量之间关系的基本理论模型。 该项目由NSF的科学，技术，工程和数学奖学金计划资助，该计划旨在增加低收入学术人才的数量，这些学生表现出经济需求，并获得STEM领域的学位。它还旨在改善未来STEM工作者的教育，并产生关于低收入学生的学术成功，保留，转移，毕业和学术/职业道路的知识。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并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，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

The Impact of a School-Based Academic Support Program on Students’ Psychosocial Impairment

校本学术支持计划对学生心理社会障碍的影响

• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: Journal of educational and developmental psychology
• 作者: White, Gwyne W.;Hatchimonji, Danielle R.;Vaid, Esha;Caldwell Jr., Rickey A;Elias, Maurice J.
• 通讯作者: Elias, Maurice J.