Pathways into the Sciences: Supporting Persistence and Graduation of Women Pursuing STEM Degrees

该项目将通过支持巴纳德学院(Barnard College)优秀低收入学生的留校和毕业来促进国家对熟练科学家的需求。巴纳德学院是一所私立女子文科学院。许多有学术天赋的女性在最初表达了对STEM的浓厚兴趣后，决定转到非STEM专业。该项目旨在通过提供财政和其他支持来帮助STEM专业的女学生坚持下去。具体地说，项目团队将向30名学生提供一至四年的奖学金，分五组录取，每组六名学生。奖学金获得者将攻读生物化学、生物科学、化学、计算机科学、数学或物理学的学士学位。学者们还将参加巴纳德的科学路径学者计划，这是一个为期四年的队列支持计划，建立在之前的国家科学基金会S-STEM奖的基础上。该项目还将研究数学焦虑、科学自我效能感、冒名顶替者的情感和竞争偏好如何影响学者的经历和轨迹。通过这样做，该项目将增加对影响低收入学生，特别是女性学生在STEM取得成功的因素的了解。这些发现将被传播，以帮助其他教育机构创建更有效的干预措施，支持学生在STEM领域取得成功。该项目的总体目标是提高低收入、高成就、在STEM领域有经济需求的本科生的学位完成率。该项目旨在：(1)提供奖学金和规划，如教师指导和职业规划，以支持30名有学术天赋的STEM学生，他们有资格获得联邦佩尔助学金；(2)提供一个全面的四年计划，帮助学者在科学教育方面出类拔萃，从而提高毅力和毕业率；以及(3)评估现有机构支持结构以及勤工俭学和学生贷款的替代对学者学术成果的影响。该研究计划旨在审查有针对性的财政援助和结构性干预措施如何提高低收入和未得到满足的经济需求的妇女在科学领域的留存率。通过回归分析和比较，该项目的研究将考察数学焦虑和科学自我效能感等因素如何随着时间的推移而变化。它还将寻求确定竞争偏好和/或冒名顶替者综合症是否会影响奖学金获得者在入门课程成绩令人失望后决定参加更高级的科学课程，并确定财政支持与其他类型支持的不同有效性。年度访谈将提供有关追求STEM职业的妇女的深入信息。该项目由NSF的科学、技术、工程和数学奖学金项目资助，该项目旨在增加在STEM领域获得学位的低收入学术天才学生的数量。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业成功、留住、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优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project will contribute to the national need for skilled scientists by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students at Barnard College, a private women’s liberal arts college. Many academically talented women decide to change to non-STEM majors after initially expressing a strong interest in STEM. This project intends to help women STEM majors persist by providing financial and other supports. Specifically, the project team will provide one- to four-year scholarships to 30 students, admitted in five cohorts of six students each. The Scholars will pursue bachelor’s degrees in Biochemistry, Biological Sciences, Chemistry, Computer Science, Mathematics, or Physics. Scholars will also participate in Barnard’s Science Pathways Scholars Program, a four-year cohort support program that builds on prior NSF S-STEM awards. The project will also study how math anxiety, science self-efficacy, imposter feelings, and competitive preferences affect Scholars’ experiences and trajectories. In doing so, the project will increase understanding about factors that affect the success of low-income students in STEM, particularly students who are women. These findings will be disseminated to help other educational institutions create more effective interventions that support student success in STEM.The overall goal of the project is to increase degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need in STEM fields. The project aims to: (1) Provide scholarships and programming, such as faculty mentoring and career planning, to support 30 academically talented STEM students who are eligible for Federal Pell Grants; (2) Provide a comprehensive four-year program that will help Scholars excel in their science education, thus enhancing perseverance and graduation; and (3) Assess the effects of existing institutional support structures and the replacement of work-study and student loans on Scholars’ academic outcomes. The research plan is designed to examine how targeted financial aid and structural interventions increase retention in the sciences of women with low income and unmet financial need. Applying regression analyses and comparisons, the project’s research study will examine how factors such as math anxiety and science self-efficacy shift over time. It will also seek to determine whether competitive preferences and/or imposter syndrome impact Scholar decisions to take more advanced science courses after disappointing grades in introductory courses, and to identify the effectiveness of financial support differentiated from other types of support. Annual interviews will provide in-depth information concerning women pursuing STEM careers. 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.