Postdoctoral Fellowship: STEMEdIPRF: Towards a Diverse Professoriate: Experiences that Inform Underrepresented Scholars' Perceptions of Value Alignment and Career Decisions

一些学院和大学致力于从代表性不足的群体中招聘个人进入STEM系的教师职位，以持续努力为本科生和研究生创造更多样化、更有效和更具包容性的学习环境。虽然成功的教师招聘努力对美国应对STEM教育挑战至关重要，但此前很少有研究关注为选择退出学术生涯的学者的决策过程提供参考的经验。该项目将侧重于代表人数不足的群体的学者，并认识到交叉性，即克伦肖所定义的种族和性别交叉性等社会特性的相互联系的性质。这一博士后研究奖学金项目旨在加深我们对决定退出学术生涯的因素的理解。拟议的项目旨在增进对STEM学者从代表不足的获得终端学位的群体中选择职业的过程的了解，并增进对影响这些选择的经验的理解。具体地说，该项目旨在解决以下研究目标：1)确定学者的价值观和在家庭、社区和文化背景下影响这些价值观的发展经历；2)评估研究生期间的经历，这些经历形成了学者对这些价值观与学术作为就业兴趣因素的一致或不一致的看法；以及3)考察随着时间的推移对学者职业决策和价值观的影响。为了实现这些目标，研究人员将进行一项纵向定性研究，利用现象学方法，在社会认知职业理论的指导下，探索全国大学化学研究生项目中未被充分代表的群体的学者的职业选择过程。该项目由STEM教育博士后研究奖学金(STEM Ed PRF)项目资助，旨在提高STEM、STEM教育、这一奖项反映了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。

Some colleges and universities work to recruit individuals from underrepresented groups into faculty positions in STEM departments in ongoing efforts to create more diverse, effective, and inclusive learning environments for undergraduate and graduate students. While successful faculty recruitment efforts are essential for the Nation to meet STEM educational challenges, little prior research has focused on experiences that inform the decision-making processes of scholars who opt out of academic careers. This project will focus on scholars from underrepresented groups and recognize intersectionality, that is the interconnected nature of social identities such as race and gender intersectionality, as defined by Crenshaw. This postdoctoral research fellowship project is designed to deepen our understanding of the factors that contribute to decisions to opt out of academic careers.The proposed project aims to advance knowledge of the career choice processes for STEM scholars from underrepresented groups receiving terminal degrees and advance understanding of the experiences that inform those choices. Specifically, the project is designed to address the following research aims: 1) identify scholars’ values and the developmental experiences that informed those values within the context of families, communities, and cultures; 2) evaluate graduate school experiences that shaped scholars’ perceptions of the alignment or misalignment of those values with academia as a factor in employment interests; and 3) examine influences on scholars’ career decisions and values over time. To accomplish these aims, the investigator will conduct a longitudinal qualitative study to explore the career choice processes of scholars from underrepresented groups in chemistry graduate programs at universities across the country using phenomenographic methodology and guided by Social Cognitive Career Theory.This project is funded by the STEM Education Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (STEM Ed PRF) program that aims to enhance the research knowledge, skills, and practices of recent doctorates in STEM, STEM education, education, and related disciplines to advance their preparation to engage in fundamental and applied research that advances knowledge within the field.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.