Pathways into the Sciences: Supporting Persistence and Graduation of Women Pursuing STEM Degrees

该项目将通过支持成绩优异的低收入学生在私立女子文科学院巴纳德学院的留校和毕业，为满足国家对熟练科学家的需求做出贡献。许多有学术天赋的女性在最初表达了对STEM的浓厚兴趣后，决定转为非STEM专业。该项目旨在通过提供财政和其他支持，帮助妇女坚持STEM专业。 具体而言，项目小组将为30名学生提供一至四年的奖学金，分五批录取，每批六名学生。 这些学者将攻读生物化学、生物科学、化学、计算机科学、数学或物理学的学士学位。 学者们还将参加巴纳德的科学途径学者计划，这是一个为期四年的队列支持计划，建立在以前的NSF S-STEM奖的基础上。 该项目还将研究数学焦虑，科学自我效能，冒名顶替者的感觉和竞争偏好如何影响学者的经验和轨迹。 在这样做的过程中，该项目将增加对影响低收入学生在STEM中取得成功的因素的了解，特别是女性学生。这些研究结果将被传播，以帮助其他教育机构创建更有效的干预措施，支持学生在STEM领域取得成功。该项目的总体目标是提高低收入，高成就的本科生在STEM领域的经济需求。 该项目旨在：（1）提供奖学金和项目，如教师指导和职业规划，以支持30名有资格获得联邦佩尔赠款的学术天赋的STEM学生;（2）提供一个全面的四年计划，帮助学者在科学教育中脱颖而出，从而提高毅力和毕业;及（3）评估现有院校支援架构及取代勤工俭学及学生贷款对学者学业成果的影响。 该研究计划旨在研究有针对性的财政援助和结构性干预措施如何提高低收入和未满足经济需求的妇女在科学领域的保留率。 应用回归分析和比较，该项目的研究将研究数学焦虑和科学自我效能感等因素如何随着时间的推移而变化。 它还将寻求确定竞争偏好和/或冒名顶替综合症是否会影响学者在入门课程成绩令人失望后选择更高级科学课程的决定，并确定与其他类型支持不同的财政支持的有效性。年度访谈将提供有关追求STEM职业的女性的深入信息。该项目由NSF的科学，技术，工程和数学奖学金计划资助，该计划旨在增加低收入学术人才的数量，这些学生表现出经济需求，并获得STEM领域的学位。它还旨在改善未来STEM工作者的教育，并产生关于低收入学生的学术成功，保留，转移，毕业和学术/职业道路的知识。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project will contribute to the national need for skilled scientists by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students at Barnard College, a private women’s liberal arts college. Many academically talented women decide to change to non-STEM majors after initially expressing a strong interest in STEM. This project intends to help women STEM majors persist by providing financial and other supports. Specifically, the project team will provide one- to four-year scholarships to 30 students, admitted in five cohorts of six students each. The Scholars will pursue bachelor’s degrees in Biochemistry, Biological Sciences, Chemistry, Computer Science, Mathematics, or Physics. Scholars will also participate in Barnard’s Science Pathways Scholars Program, a four-year cohort support program that builds on prior NSF S-STEM awards. The project will also study how math anxiety, science self-efficacy, imposter feelings, and competitive preferences affect Scholars’ experiences and trajectories. In doing so, the project will increase understanding about factors that affect the success of low-income students in STEM, particularly students who are women. These findings will be disseminated to help other educational institutions create more effective interventions that support student success in STEM.The overall goal of the project is to increase degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need in STEM fields. The project aims to: (1) Provide scholarships and programming, such as faculty mentoring and career planning, to support 30 academically talented STEM students who are eligible for Federal Pell Grants; (2) Provide a comprehensive four-year program that will help Scholars excel in their science education, thus enhancing perseverance and graduation; and (3) Assess the effects of existing institutional support structures and the replacement of work-study and student loans on Scholars’ academic outcomes. The research plan is designed to examine how targeted financial aid and structural interventions increase retention in the sciences of women with low income and unmet financial need. Applying regression analyses and comparisons, the project’s research study will examine how factors such as math anxiety and science self-efficacy shift over time. It will also seek to determine whether competitive preferences and/or imposter syndrome impact Scholar decisions to take more advanced science courses after disappointing grades in introductory courses, and to identify the effectiveness of financial support differentiated from other types of support. Annual interviews will provide in-depth information concerning women pursuing STEM careers. This project is funded by NSF’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, which seeks to increase the number of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need who earn degrees in STEM fields. It also aims to improve the education of future STEM workers, and to generate knowledge about academic success, retention, transfer, graduation, and academic/career pathways of low-income students.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.