Cultivating Tomorrow’s Engineers through the Entertainment & Hospitality Landscape

通过娱乐培养明天的工程师

• 批准号: 2115331
• 负责人: Emma Regentova
• 金额: $ 88.27万
• 依托单位: University of Nevada Las Vegas
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-09-01 至 2024-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2115331&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Cultivating; Tomorrow; Engineers; through; Entertainment

This Innovations in Development project aims to foster the development of STEM identity among a diverse group of middle school students and, in turn, motivate them to pursue in STEM interests and careers. Vegas STEM Lab, led by a team of investigators from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, will employ a mix of online and on-site activities to introduce students to engineering methods in the context of the entertainment and hospitality (E&H) industry that is the lifeblood of Las Vegas. Investigators will collaborate with local resorts, multimedia designers, and arts institutions to offer field experiences for students to interview, interact with, and learn from local experts. The Lab will help youth overcome prevailing beliefs of STEM as boring and difficult, boost their confidence as STEM-capable individuals, and expose them to the exciting STEM careers available in their hometown. UNLV engineering undergrads will serve as near-peer mentors to the middle school students, guiding them through Lab activities and acting as role models. Investigators will measure student learning and engagement over the course of the Vegas STEM Lab experience with the aim of understanding how the Lab model—with its rich set of activities and interpersonal interactions set in the local E&H industry—can cultivate STEM identity development and encourage students to pursue STEM pathways. Despite the project’s hyperlocal focus on the Las Vegas community, if successful, other cities and towns may learn from and adapt the Lab model for use in their youth development programs. Vegas STEM Lab will provide online materials for students’ STEM learning during the academic year followed by on-site visits and hands-on project development during a three-week summer experience. The Lab will run for three years with cohorts of 40 students each (N=120) with the aim of iteratively improving its activities and outcomes from year to year. The local school district will help recruit middle school students who have demonstrated low interest in STEM to participate in the Lab, ensuring that participants reflect the demographic makeup of the Las Vegas community in terms of race and ethnicity, socio-economic status, and gender. Summer activities will take students behind the scenes of the city’s major E&H venues; investigate the workings of large-scale displays, light shows, and “smart hospitality” systems; and then build their own smaller scale engineering projects. Investigators will employ the Dynamic Systems Model of Role Identity (DSMRI) framework to study how intentionally designed Lab experiences shape students’ understanding of themselves, their future aspirations, and their grasp of the scientific enterprise. Summer activities will be integrated into the online learning platform at the end of each year of Vegas STEM Lab, and in the final year of the project, workshops will train local educators to use the platform in either formal or informal learning settings. Materials and research findings produced through this work will be disseminated to middle school teachers and afterschool care providers, and shared with researchers through academic publications and conferences. This Innovations in Development project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which seeks to (a) advance new approaches to and evidence-based understanding of the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments; (b) provide multiple pathways for broadening access to and engagement in STEM learning experiences; (c) advance innovative research on and assessment of STEM learning in informal environments; and (d) engage the public of all ages in learning STEM in informal environments.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.

这一发展中的创新项目旨在促进不同的中学生群体对STEM认同感的发展，进而激励他们追求STEM的兴趣和职业。拉斯维加斯STEM实验室由来自内华达大学拉斯维加斯分校的一组调查人员领导，将采用在线和现场活动相结合的方式，向学生介绍娱乐和酒店(E&amp；H)行业背景下的工程方法，娱乐和酒店业是拉斯维加斯的命脉。调查人员将与当地度假村、多媒体设计师和艺术机构合作，为学生提供实地经验，供他们采访、互动并向当地专家学习。该实验室将帮助年轻人克服普遍认为STEM乏味和困难的观念，增强他们作为STEM能力人的信心，并让他们接触到家乡提供的激动人心的STEM职业。UNLV工程学本科生将作为中学生的近乎同行的导师，指导他们完成实验室活动，并充当榜样。调查人员将在拉斯维加斯STEM实验室体验的整个过程中衡量学生的学习和参与度，目的是了解实验室模式--其丰富的活动和人际互动设置在当地的E&amp；H行业--如何培养STEM认同感，并鼓励学生追求STEM路径。尽管该项目的重点是拉斯维加斯社区的超本地化，但如果成功，其他城市和城镇可能会学习和调整实验室模式，用于他们的青年发展项目。拉斯维加斯STEM实验室将在学年期间为学生提供STEM学习的在线材料，然后在为期三周的暑期体验中进行现场访问和实践项目开发。该实验室将运行三年，每个队列有40名学生(N=120)，目的是年复一年地反复改进其活动和成果。当地学区将帮助招收对STEM兴趣不大的中学生参加实验室，确保参与者在种族和民族、社会经济地位和性别方面反映拉斯维加斯社区的人口构成。暑期活动将带学生到该市主要E&amp；H场馆的幕后；调查大型展示、灯光秀和“智能接待”系统的工作原理；然后建造他们自己的较小规模的工程项目。研究人员将使用角色认同的动态系统模型(DSMRI)框架来研究有意设计的实验室体验如何塑造学生对自己的理解、他们未来的抱负以及他们对科学事业的把握。暑期活动将在拉斯维加斯STEM实验室每年年底纳入在线学习平台，在项目的最后一年，讲习班将培训当地教育工作者在正式或非正式学习环境中使用该平台。通过这项工作产生的材料和研究成果将分发给中学教师和课后托管提供者，并通过学术出版物和会议与研究人员分享。这一创新发展项目由推进非正式STEM学习计划(AISL)资助，该计划旨在：(A)促进对非正式环境中STEM学习的设计和开发的新方法和基于证据的理解；(B)为扩大获得和参与STEM学习经验提供多种途径；(C)推进对非正式环境中STEM学习的创新研究和评估；以及(D)让所有年龄段的公众在非正式环境中学习STEM。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。