Single-Sex High Schools and STEM Careers: Males, Females and Low-SES Students

描述(由申请人提供)：尽管在过去的几十年里，美国和其他发达国家的女性在整体教育水平方面取得了显著进步，但STEM大学专业和职业中女性的比例远远低于男性的比例，父母社会经济地位(SES)低背景的人的比例也远远低于SES背景高的人。在拟议的项目中，我们将调查一家特定的教育机构--单一性别高中--是否通过培养和保持女孩在学校和工作期间对STEM的兴趣，从而鼓励对STEM职业感兴趣的学生群体中更多的性别多样性，来帮助克服STEM学习中的性别和父母背景平等问题。除了主要关注女生外，该项目还将评估男校对男生的影响。与之前的文献相比，这个项目的一个关键改进是使用了来自韩国的数据，在韩国大部分地区，学生和教师都被随机分配到男女同校的学术高中。在韩国，学生被随机分配到高中，使我们能够根据观察数据解决之前大多数研究遭受的选择偏见，并对单一性别高中的影响做出因果推断。具体地说，我们将利用四组不同的全国代表性高中学生和大学毕业生的数据，探讨是否应该增加在全女生高中学习的可能性：1)高中女生在标准化数学和科学考试中的表现；2)高中女生预计她们继续上大学时将攻读STEM专业的概率；3)女孩继续上大学后实际攻读STEM专业的可能性；4)女孩完成正规教育后进入STEM职业的可能性。除了单一性别高中的平均影响外，我们还将探讨在全女生高中学习的这些影响是否取决于父母的SES，例如，对于父母SES背景较低的女孩，影响更大。最后，我们将研究在全男校学习是否会对男孩产生同样的影响。通过在韩国全国随机数据的基础上检验单一性别高中的短期和长期影响，该项目承诺显著改善我们对单一性别高中是否可能成为解决STEM职业生涯中女性和低SES学生匮乏问题的重要机构的认识。从我们的研究中得出的关于单一性别学校影响的因果推断，可以为其他地方最近的教育努力提供及时的科学证据。例如，2006年，美国教育部制定了新的规定，使学区更容易提供单一性别教育。因此，作为单一性别学校或在男女同校学校内提供单一性别教室的公立学校的数量从1995年的3所飙升至2009年9月的545多所。 与公共健康相关：美国教育部最近修改了法规，根据单一性别学校教育美国儿童的潜力，更容易建立单一性别公立学校。我们的项目将通过得出关于单一性别高中是否促进女性和经济困难学生参与科学、技术、工程和数学(STEM)职业的因果推理来为公共政策提供信息。如果女性和经济困难学生增加数学和科学知识，专注于STEM专业，这肯定会导致在与卫生研究和实践相关的领域工作的女性和经济困难学生的增加。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Despite the significant progress of women in overall educational attainment during the last few decades in the United States and other developed countries, the proportion of females in STEM college majors and occupations is much smaller than the proportion of males and the proportion of individuals from low parental SES (socioeconomic status) backgrounds is much lower than those from higher SES backgrounds. In the proposed project, we will investigate whether one particular educational institution - single-sex high schools - help overcome gender and parental background equity issues in STEM learning by developing and maintaining interest in STEM among girls as they progress through school and job, and thus encouraging more gender diversity within the population of students interested in STEM careers. In addition to the major focus on girls, this project will also assess effects of all-boys schools on boys as well. A critical improvement of this project over previous literature is to use data from South Korea where both students and teachers are randomly assigned into single-sex vs. coeducational academic high schools in most of the country. The random assignment of students into high schools in Korea enables us to address selection biases from which most previous studies have suffered on the basis of observational data, and to draw causal inferences on the effects of single-sex high schools. Specifically, using four different data sets of nationally representative high school students and college graduates, we will address whether studying in all-girls high schools should increase 1) the performance of high school girls on standardized mathematics and science tests; 2) the probability that high school girls expect that they will have STEM majors when they continue on to universities; 3) the probability that girls subsequently actually have STEM majors when they continue on to universities; 4) the probability that girls will enter STEM occupations when they complete their formal education. In addition to average effects of single-sex high schools, we will also address 5) whether these effects of studying in all-girls high schools depend on parental SES, for example, with stronger effects for girls from lower parental SES backgrounds. Finally, we will examine whether studying in all-boys' schools have parallel effects on boys. By examining both short-term and longer-tem effects of single-sex high schools on the basis of the nation-wide randomized data from Korea, the project thus promises significant improvements of our knowledge regarding whether single-sex high schools might be an important institution to address the paucity of females and low- SES students in STEM careers. Causal inferences on single-sex school effects drawn from our study can offer timely scientific evidence for recent educational efforts elsewhere. In 2006, for example, the US Department of Education established new regulations to make it easier for school districts to offer single-sex education. As a result, the number of public schools that are single-sex schools or offer single-sex classrooms within coeducational schools has soared from 3 in 1995 to more than 545 in September 2009. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The United States Department of Education has recently changed regulations to make it easier to establish single-sex public schools, based on the potentials of single-sex schooling for educating American children. Our project will inform public policy by drawing causal inferences on whether single-sex high schools promote participation of females and economically disadvantaged students in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) careers. If there is an increase in mathematics and science knowledge and focus on STEM majors by females and economically disadvantaged students, this surely will lead to increases in females and economically disadvantaged students working in areas related to health research and practice.