The Role of Academic Achievement and Social Inclusion in Broadening STEM Participation: Intended and Actual Attainment at the Intersection of Gender and Race/Ethnicity

这项研究对有关科学、技术、工程和数学(STEM)教育差异的文献做出了重大贡献，提供了关于来自不同种族/民族亚群的男孩和女孩从中学到大学结束的STEM轨迹的新信息。来自德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校的研究人员将使用五个全面、大规模和纵向的数据集，检查不同亚组之间在预期和实际STEM成就上的差异，并调查学业成就和社会包容的模式如何导致这些差异。五个数据集中有三个是具有全国代表性的样本，另外两个是在德克萨斯州收集的，包括大量拉美裔学生的样本。另外，这五个数据集提供了检查某些衡量学业成绩和社会包容性的独特衡量标准的机会；总的来说，它们提供了调查从六年级到大学毕业的种族/族裔和性别交汇处的STEM轨迹的机会。将特别关注少数族裔女孩/妇女和少数族裔男孩/男子的经历，以更全面和更全面地比较当代不平等的模式。分析侧重于两个研究目的：1)考察学业成绩和社会包容如何导致按性别和种族/民族分组划分的初中和高中期间预期STEM成绩的差异；以及2)考察学业成绩和社会包容如何导致按性别和种族/民族分组划分的大学期间实际STEM成绩的差异。统计分析包括使用Logistic回归和多项Logistic回归的模型，以及检验学校或课堂水平影响的多水平模型。通过对各种关于期望职业的调查问题的回答，并将相对偏好与非STEM职业进行比较，来衡量预期的STEM成就。学业成绩是通过成绩、考试成绩和选修课程来衡量的。社会包容性是通过对感知到的同伴和教师支持以及感知到的公平待遇等问题的回答来衡量的。这项研究的框架以交叉性理论为基础，这些理论侧重于性别和种族/族裔的交集，以及当一个人是地位相对较低的两个不同群体的成员时可能适用的多重危险。这项分析利用大规模数据明确处理不同群体的经历，并发现可能肯定这种危险的模式，或确定学生在教育环境中取得成功时的复原力实例。该项目的最终目标是通过提供关于促进或阻碍妇女和少数族裔青年在STEM领域留住和取得成就的因素的新知识，扩大STEM的参与。调查结果将在学术和与政策有关的会议上发表，发表在顶级同行评议的教育和社会学期刊上，并通过新闻稿分发给地方和国家媒体，以接触到广大公众。研究小组还将利用他们与国家教师专业发展计划的现有关系，向全国中小学教师的主要受众交流研究成果。此外，该项目正在努力通过招聘和培训STEM教育和社会学领域的妇女和少数族裔博士生来扩大参与度。这些学生的不同观点，加上他们将接受的严格的分析培训，对于培养未来一代学术研究人员研究STEM平等至关重要。

This study makes a major contribution to the literature on disparities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education by providing new information about the STEM trajectories of boys and girls from various racial/ethnic subgroups from middle school through the end of college. Using five comprehensive, large-scale and longitudinal datasets, researchers from the University of Texas at Austin will examine differences between subgroups in intended as well as actual STEM attainment and investigate how patterns of academic achievement and social inclusion contribute to those differences. Three of the five datasets are nationally representative samples while the other two were collected in Texas and include large sample populations of Hispanic students. Separately the five datasets provide the opportunity to examine certain unique measures of academic achievement and social inclusion; collectively they provide the chance to investigate STEM trajectories at the intersection of race/ethnicity and gender from the 6th grade to the end of college. Special attention will be paid to the experiences of minority girls/women and minority boys/men to gain a more comprehensive and comparative picture of contemporary patterns of inequality.The analysis focuses on two research aims: 1) to examine how academic achievement and social inclusion contribute to differences in intended STEM attainment during middle and high school by gender and racial/ethnic subgroup; and 2) to examine how academic achievement and social inclusion contribute to differences in actual STEM attainment during college by gender and racial/ethnic subgroup. Statistical analyses include models using logistic and multinomial logistic regression and multi-level models to examine school or classroom level effects. Intended STEM attainment is measured using the answers to various survey questions about desired occupation and comparing the relative preferences with non-STEM occupations. Academic achievement is measured using grades, test scores and course-taking. Social inclusion is measured using answers to questions about perceived peer and teacher support and perceived equitable treatment. The framework of the study is grounded in theories of intersectionality that focus on the intersection of gender and race/ethnicity and the multiple jeopardy that may apply when one is a member of two different groups with relatively lower status. This analysis uses large-scale data to explicitly address the experiences of different groups and to uncover patterns that may affirm this jeopardy or identify instances of resiliency when students succeed in educational environments.The ultimate goal of the project is to broaden STEM participation by contributing new knowledge about the factors that promote or impede the retention and attainment of women and minority youth in STEM fields. Findings will be presented at academic and policy-related conferences, published in top-tier peer-reviewed journals in education and sociology, and distributed through press releases to local and national media outlets to reach a broad public audience. The research team will also use their extant relationships with national teacher professional development programs to communicate research findings to key audiences of primary and secondary teachers across the country. Additionally, the project is working to broaden participation through the recruitment and training of women and minority doctoral students in the fields of STEM education and sociology. The diverse perspectives of these students, coupled with the rigorous analytical training they will receive, are critical for preparing future generations of academic researchers to study STEM equality.