RAPID: Investigating the impact of online internships in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic

威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校大学-劳动力转型研究中心的研究人员将与Parker Dewey合作，生成一个关于在线实习对学生进步影响的强大混合方法数据集。实习是许多STEM学术项目的强制要求，是一种基于工作的学习形式，可以为本科生和研究生带来学术和职场上的成功。传统的面对面实习也可以增强学生的社会网络和技术和可转移的专业技能。然而，2019冠状病毒病大流行使得许多工作场所无法进行面对面的实习，因为有居家令和社交距离要求，导致大量大学生涌入帕克·杜威等供应商寻求这些机会。然而，关于在线或微型实习质量的研究很少，高等教育专业人员对学生对这些新形式的基于工作的学习的体验以及它们对学生的职业和学术发展的后续影响知之甚少。这项研究将通过提供关于在线实习的新经验见解以及可操作的知识来满足这一需求，从而为教师和职业顾问在疫情期间和之后就学生的实习机会做出决策提供信息。该项目将考察以下研究问题：(1)过去（2015年至2020年初）和现在的在线实习生的人口特征是什么？(2)网络实习生经历了哪些类型的任务和指导？(3)在线实习对学生的职业和学术发展、专业网络和可转移技能有何影响？(4)在线实习采用虚拟模拟创新来提升实习体验的前景如何？这些问题将通过三个不同但相互关联的研究来回答，包括对帕克杜威过去的学生参与者（n= 1500）的分析，对目前帕克杜威项目参与者的调查（n= 2500）和访谈（n=50），以及对stem相关领域的雇主（n=25）的访谈，内容涉及2019冠状病毒病大流行期间实习项目的形式。因此，本研究利用了大规模调查数据的优势和定性数据更细粒度的“内幕”视角。该研究将是对在线实习的首次实证研究，对体验式学习和劳动力发展领域做出了重大贡献。鉴于在线实习和某种形式的社交距离将继续存在的可能性，对美国高等教育来说，在这一主题上迅速产生科学严谨的发现是一个时间敏感的问题。该RAPID奖由研究生教育司/教育和人力资源理事会的EHR核心研究（ECR）项目提供，资金来自《冠状病毒援助、救济和经济安全（关怀）法案》。ECR支持以STEM学习和学习环境、扩大STEM参与和STEM劳动力发展为重点的基础研究。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。

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Center for Research on College-Workforce Transitions will partner with Parker Dewey to generate a robust mixed-methods dataset about the impact of online internships on student progression. Internships, mandated by many STEM academic programs, are a form of work-based learning that can lead to academic and workforce success for undergraduate and graduate students. Traditional face-to-face internships also can enhance students’ social networks and technical and transferrable professional skills. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has made face-to-face internships untenable for many workplaces, with stay-at-home orders and social distancing requirements, resulting in a large influx of college students to vendors such as Parker Dewey seeking these opportunities. However, there is little research on the quality of online or micro-internships, and higher education professionals have little knowledge about their students’ experiences with these new forms of work-based learning and their subsequent impact on students’ career and academic development. This study will fill this need by contributing both new empirical insights on online internships as well as actionable knowledge to inform faculty and career advisors’ decision making about students’ internship opportunities during and beyond the pandemic. The project will examine the following research questions: (1) What are the demographic characteristics of past (2015 to early 2020) and current online interns? (2) What types of tasks and mentoring are experienced by online interns? (3) What is the impact of an online internship on student career and academic development, professional networks, and transferable skills? and, (4) What are the prospects for online internships to adopt innovations in virtual simulations to enhance the internship experience? These questions will be answered through three distinct yet inter-related studies that include analyses of Parker Dewey’s past student participants (n=1,500), surveys (n=2,500) and interviews (n=50) with current Parker Dewey program participants, and interviews with employers in STEM-related fields (n=25) regarding the format of internship programs amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, the research leverages the strengths of large-scale survey data and the more fine-grained “insider” perspective of qualitative data. The study will be the first empirical study of online internships and represents a significant contribution to the fields of experiential learning and workforce development. Given the likelihood that online internships and some form of social distancing will continue, generating rapid scientifically rigorous findings on this topic is a time-sensitive concern for U.S. higher education. This RAPID award is made by the EHR Core Research (ECR) program in the Division of Graduate Education/Directorate of Education and Human Resources, using funds from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. ECR supports fundamental research focused on STEM learning and learning environments, broadening participation in STEM, and STEM workforce development.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.