Building a Youth-Led Learning Community through Automating Hydroponic Systems

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In this project, youth will apply scientific and computational science concepts and practices by learning to create and build automated systems where they can grow their own food. These specialized growing systems will utilize hydroponics where plants are grown without soil. Computational science is an interdisciplinary area that combines skills and knowledge from science, computation, computer science, engineering, and mathematics to solve problems. The prevalence of computational science in industry and everyday lives necessitates the development of a STEM workforce knowledgeable to solve complex real-world problems. Researchers will train high school youth to program low-cost micro-controllers to collect data and use that data to automate hydroponic systems. To support the high school youth's interest in obtaining a post-secondary degree, they will be mentored by first-generation college students from alumni of Boston College's College Bound program and Lasell University's Pathways to Diversity.This project will study ways to design an internal learning environment that promotes youth skills and interest in pursuing STEM careers. Utilizing a design-based research framework and drawing upon a mixed-method data collection approach including observations, surveys, interviews, and youth generated artifacts, the project team will explore how and in what ways the use of physical computing coupled with computational science improves youth interest and knowledge to pursue STEM careers. Survey data will be analyzed by first evaluating the measurement quality of the latent variables using confirmatory factor analysis and then using latent variable growth modeling to assess changes in repeated measures for four time points. The research and evaluation work will track 500 youth and their families over time and evaluate what aspects of the program are critical to youth success and STEM career self-efficacy and awareness. This work offers an approach to support youth in examining careers across fields of agriculture, computation, and science teaching. This project is funded by the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program, which supports projects that build understandings of practices, program elements, contexts and processes contributing to increasing students' knowledge and interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) and information and communication technology (ICT) careers.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.