Becoming a Scientist: A Study of Identity Balance and the Persistence of Hispanic Undergraduate Students in Engineering and Biological Sciences

成为一名科学家：身份平衡与西班牙裔工程和生物科学本科生的坚持研究

• 批准号: 2334638
• 负责人: Paul Schultz
• 金额: $ 190.53万
• 依托单位: Claremont Graduate University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-07-01 至 2024-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2334638&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Becoming; Scientist; Study; Identity; Balance

Advancing a diverse and technically competent STEM workforce is critical for contributing to the progress of science and to the health, prosperity and welfare of our nation. While the number of Hispanic students, who are U.S. citizens and permanent residents, earning STEM bachelor's degrees has increased rapidly during the past decade, Hispanic students enrolled in STEM programs are leaving college or switching majors at higher rates than their White peers. This loss may be related to the stereotypes, lack of support, and the exclusionary spaces that Hispanic students are exposed to in college. Research suggests that developing and maintaining a strong STEM identity is an important predictor of persistence and success in STEM disciplines. Understanding the complexity of Hispanic students' identity, and the balance of that identity, in the context of social stereotypes, could lead to improved STEM undergraduate academic, research and internship programs, which would advance persistence to bachelor's degree completion. The project team is exploring a framework that considers both implicitly and explicitly held identities for understanding how students achieve and maintain a strong STEM identity across time, and what experiences facilitate or hinder this process. The researchers hypothesize that the strength and nature of the balance between implicitly held associations and identities influence student's explicitly held STEM identity, and that these processes are qualitatively different due to prevailing stereotypes for White and Hispanic undergraduate students, enrolled in Engineering and Biological Sciences degree programs. The current investigation is also examining the identity trajectories of White and Hispanic undergraduate students as they make critical career and academic decisions. Results from the research are advancing knowledge about balanced STEM identity for historically underrepresented minorities. Findings inform university administrators and educators about how their institutions might make evidence-based modifications to undergraduate research, internship and academic programs that impact minority STEM student retention and persistence to degree completion. This research is supported by NSF's EHR Core Research (ECR) program. The ECR program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that generates foundational knowledge in the field. Investments are made in critical areas that are essential, broad and enduring: STEM learning and STEM learning environments, broadening participation in STEM, and STEM workforce development. The program supports the accumulation of robust evidence to inform efforts to understand, build theory to explain, and suggest intervention and innovations to address persistent challenges in STEM interest, education, learning and participation.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.

促进多元化和技术上能力的STEM劳动力对于为科学进步以及我们国家的健康，繁荣和福利做出贡献至关重要。尽管在过去的十年中，获得STEM学士学位的西班牙裔学生人数，是美国公民和永久居民，赢得STEM学士学位的人数迅速增加，而参加STEM课程的西班牙裔学生却在离开大学或以比白人同龄人更高的速度离开大学专业。这种损失可能与刻板印象，缺乏支持以及西班牙裔学生在大学中接触的排他性空间有关。 研究表明，发展和维持强大的STEM身份是STEM学科中持久性和成功的重要预测指标。 了解西班牙裔学生的身份的复杂性，以及在社会刻板印象的背景下，这种身份的平衡可能会导致STEM本科学术，研究和实习计划的改善，这将使坚持不懈地持续完成学士学位。 项目团队正在探索一个框架，该框架既隐含和明确地拥有身份，以了解学生如何在整个时间内实现和保持强大的STEM身份，以及什么经验有助于或阻碍了这一过程。 研究人员假设，隐式持有的关联和身份之间平衡的力量和性质会影响学生明确拥有的STEM身份，并且由于白人和西班牙裔本质的学生的普遍定型观念，这些过程在质量上有所不同，该学生参与了工程和生物科学学位课程。 当前的调查还在研究白人和西班牙裔本科生的身份轨迹，因为他们做出了关键的职业和学术决策。 该研究的结果是在历史上代表性不足的少数群体中提高了有关平衡STEM身份的知识。 调查结果为大学管理人员和教育工作者提供了有关其机构如何对影响少数族裔STEM Stem学生保留和持久性完成学位完成的本科研究，实习和学术课程进行基于证据的修改。这项研究得到了NSF的EHR核心研究（ECR）计划的支持。 ECR计划强调了基本的STEM教育研究，该研究在该领域产生了基础知识。投资是在重要，广泛和持久的关键领域进行的：STEM学习和STEM学习环境，扩大参与STEM以及STEM劳动力的发展。该计划支持积累强大的证据，以告知努力，以理解，建立理论来解释和提出干预和创新，以应对STEM兴趣，教育，学习和参与方面的持续挑战。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被视为值得通过基金会的知识分子和更广泛影响的评估来通过评估来提供支持。