Conference: Research Infrastructure for Informal STEM Education

非正式STEM教育研究基础设施会议将汇集教育研究人员、产品开发商、资助者和社区组织，为支持公平的非正式STEM学习研究的新基础设施制定概念性计划。科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）的公平参与对于我们国家所有社区的繁荣至关重要。然而，仍然存在许多阻碍公平参与成为现实的障碍。非正式的科学学习——如教育游戏、课外时间节目、科学博物馆和媒体——如果在设计时考虑到社区的需求和兴趣，可以为减少STEM领域的不平等提供一条途径。阻碍设计公平的非正式STEM学习体验的一个因素是通过研究这些体验而产生的回音室。研究往往侧重于这些环境中现有的或投入最多的受众，而代表性不足的社区的声音可能会缺席。提高STEM参与的公平性意味着提高STEM学习研究的贡献者和参与者之间的公平性。为了解决这个问题，许多学者呼吁采取非正式STEM学习研究的方法，强调研究人员、从业者和社区合作伙伴之间的合作。会议将通过召集25个主要利益相关者讨论支持以公平为重点的非正式STEM学习研究所需的研究基础设施，解决非正式科学学习中的历史不平等问题。此外，将邀请100多名非正式STEM学习研究人员和产品开发人员、社区组织、公共机构和慈善基金会通过会前和会后活动参与讨论。为期两天的虚拟会议将旨在回答一个首要问题：研究基础设施需要哪些构建模块，以促进非正式科学学习研究人员、实践者和社区组织的公平目标？为了回答这个问题，会议的第一天将举办旨在通过参与对话促进参与者对彼此STEM公平目标的理解的活动。与会者还将分享实现这些目标的现有资源。第二天，与会者将确定拟议的国家基础设施的必要要素，例如，确定以社区为基础的研究地点，建立适合社区环境的共享工具，以及建立一个在社区组织和研究人员之间提供直接联系的数据库。会议结束后，项目团队将把研究结果综合成一份数字多媒体报告，该报告将通过Knology的网站和informalscience.org发布。该项目得到了比尔及梅林达•盖茨基金会、施密特期货和沃尔顿家族基金会的合作支持。NSF的推进非正式STEM学习（AISL）计划也提供资金。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Research Infrastructure for Informal STEM Education conference will bring together education researchers, product developers, funders, and community organizations to develop a conceptual plan for new infrastructure that supports research on equitable informal STEM learning. Equitable participation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) is essential if all our nation’s communities are to thrive. Yet, many barriers still exist that prevent equitable participation from becoming a reality. Informal science learning—such as educational gaming, out-of-school time programming, science museums, and media—can offer a pathway for reducing inequities in STEM if they are designed with community needs and interests in mind. One factor that prevents the design of equitable informal STEM learning experiences is the echo chamber that occurs through the study of these experiences. Research often focuses on the existing or the most invested audiences in these settings, and the voices of underrepresented communities can be absent. Increasing equity in STEM participation means increasing equity among those contributing to and participating in STEM learning research. To address this, many scholars have called for approaches to informal STEM learning research that emphasize collaborations between researchers, practitioners, and community partners. The conference will address historic inequities in informal science learning by bringing together 25 key stakeholders to discuss the research infrastructure needed to support the study of equity-focused informal STEM learning. In addition, over 100 informal STEM learning researchers and product developers, community-based organizations, public institutions, and philanthropic foundations will be invited to contribute to the discussion through pre and post conference activities. The two-day virtual conference will be designed to answer one overarching question: What building blocks are needed in research infrastructure so that it advances the equity aims of informal science learning researchers, practitioners, and community-based organizations? To answer this question, the first day of the conference will feature activities designed to advance participants’ understanding of each other's STEM equity aims through engaged dialogue. Participants will also share existing resources for achieving these aims. On the second day, participants will identify the necessary elements of the proposed national infrastructure—for example, the identification of community-based sites for research, the establishment of shared instruments appropriate to community settings, and the creation of a database that provides direct connections between community organizations and researchers. Following the conference, the project team will synthesize the findings into a digital multimedia report that will be available through Knology’s website and at informalscience.org.This project is supported through a partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Schmidt Futures, and the Walton Family Foundation. Funding is also provided by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) Program at NSF.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.