Building STEM Identity and Persistence Through STEM Pathway Mentorship

该项目将通过支持四年制女子学院布林莫尔学院（Bryn Mawr College）表现出经济需求的优秀低收入家庭学生的保留和毕业，为满足全国对受过良好教育的科学家、数学家、工程师和技术人员的需求做出贡献。该项目为期6年，将为45名攻读生物化学、生物学、物理、化学、数学、计算机科学和地质学学士学位的全日制学生提供4年奖学金。在第一学期之前的夏天，这些学生将加入STEMLA研究员计划（布林莫尔的STEM和文科），该计划支持对STEM感兴趣的低收入学生。该项目活动旨在通过以stem职业为重点的指导和额外的毕业机会来增强STEMLA的持久性。此外，还将研究STEM暑期住宿项目的有效性，该项目侧重于将基础STEM技能应用于现实问题，并通过分享经验和近同伴指导促进队列发展。其他项目活动将持续到毕业，包括暑期实习、见习机会、专业协会会员资格、会议出席支持、STEM课程支持和GRE准备。作为提供给参与者的STEM职业道路指导的一部分，该项目还将评估STEM指导的当前实践，并为教师培养学生对学术界和工业界的兴趣提供有效方法指南，帮助他们在STEM职业中建立通往成功未来的道路。此外，该项目还将针对低收入学生的独特需求，为实地和实验室研究经验制定指导方针。重要的是，这些指南将通过讲习班和出版物在地方和全国范围内传播，方案特点将在其他机构复制。研究这些机会如何影响STEM的自我效能感、STEM身份和归属感，也将有助于了解鼓励低收入学生坚持STEM的因素。由于布林莫尔学院是一所女子学院，该项目有可能扩大低收入女性在STEM劳动力中的参与。该项目的总体目标是提高有经济需求的低收入、高成就本科生的STEM学位完成率。该项目将通过增加对培养低收入学生STEM身份、自我效能和归属感的支持来实现这一目标。该项目将(1)测试住宿暑期项目的长期有效性，以帮助即将进入STEMLA的研究员决定从事STEM专业和职业；(2)评估目前STEM专业的指导实践，并促进教师在学术界内外培养研究员职业兴趣的有效方式；(3)制定关于实验科学包容性实践的指导指南，并创建一个教师培训模块，使教师能够设计和领导安全、包容性的实地体验；(4)扩大活动，提高STEM专业的留用率，帮助研究员构思STEM职业道路。社会认知职业理论（SCCT）框架研究了影响个人（包括女性和低收入和代表性不足的人群）决定继续或停止STEM教育和职业追求的心理社会因素。SCCT发现影响STEM持久性的一个关键领域是STEM自我效能信念，或个人对他们可以完成STEM任务的信念。该项目的活动专门针对已知的增强自我效能感的领域，并为学生提供在STEM中培养强烈的个人认同感的机会。该项目将通过一项纵向研究来评估STEMLA的指导支持对STEM坚持的心理社会决定因素的影响。额外的评估将检查该计划对学业成绩和毕业率的影响。该项目的成果包括：研究员的学业成绩与非低收入同龄人相当，具有强烈的STEM认同感、自我效能感和归属感，并在毕业时坚持从事STEM工作。最后，在STEM职业指导、实验室指导和实地工作中制定包容性战略的指导原则，以及通过研究这些干预措施产生的功效数据，将通过研讨会和出版物传播给K-16社区。重要的是，这些成果将为其他学院和大学提供一个框架，以实现制度转型，旨在赋予女性和低收入学生归属感、茁壮成长并坚持STEM职业。该项目由美国国家科学基金会的科学、技术、工程和数学奖学金项目资助，旨在增加有经济需求的低收入学术天才学生在STEM领域获得学位的人数。它还旨在改善未来STEM工作者的教育，并为低收入学生的学业成功、留校、转学、毕业和学术/职业道路提供知识。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 well-educated scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students with demonstrated financial need at Bryn Mawr College, a 4-year women’s college. Over its six-year duration, this project will fund 4-year scholarships to 45 unique full-time students who are pursuing bachelor’s degrees in biochemistry, biology, physics, chemistry, mathematics, computer sciences, and geology. In the summer before their first semester, these students will join the STEMLA Fellows Program (STEM and the Liberal Arts at Bryn Mawr), a program that supports low-income students interested in STEM. The project activities aim to enhance persistence of STEMLA through STEM-career-focused mentoring and additional opportunities leading to graduation. The effectiveness of a residential STEM summer program that focuses on the application of foundational STEM skills to real-world problems and promotes cohort development through shared experiences and near-peer mentorship will also be studied. Additional project activities designed to promote retention will continue until graduation and include summer internships, shadowing opportunities, professional society membership, support for conference attendance, STEM curricular support and GRE preparation. As part of the STEM career pathway mentorship provided to participants, the project will also assess current practices in STEM mentorship and generate guides for effective ways faculty can cultivate students’ interests in academia and industry, helping them build a pathway to a successful future in a STEM occupation. Additionally, the project will build mentorship guidelines for field and laboratory research experiences that are responsive to the unique needs of low-income students. Importantly, these guides will be disseminated locally and nationally, via workshops and publications, and program features will be replicable at other institutions. The study of how these opportunities affect self-efficacy, STEM identity, and belonging in STEM will also contribute to the general understanding of factors that encourage persistence in STEM for low-income students. Because Bryn Mawr College is a women’s college, this project has the potential to broaden participation of low-income women in the STEM workforce.The overall goal of this project is to increase STEM degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need. The project will accomplish this goal by increasing supports that foster STEM identity, self-efficacy, and belonging among low-income students. The project will (1) test the long-term effectiveness of a residential summer program for incoming STEMLA Fellows on their decisions to pursue STEM majors and careers; (2) assess current practices in the mentoring of STEM majors and promote effective ways faculty can cultivate Fellows’ career interests inside and outside academia, (3) develop mentorship guidelines on inclusive practices in bench science and create a faculty training module that will equip faculty to design and lead safe, inclusive field experiences, and (4) expand activities that increase retention in STEM majors and help Fellows ideate pathways to STEM careers. The Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) framework examines psychosocial factors that influence how individuals, including women and people from low-income and underrepresented populations, make decisions to pursue or discontinue STEM education and career pursuits. One key domain identified by SCCT that influences persistence in STEM is STEM self-efficacy belief, or an individual’s belief that they can accomplish STEM tasks. Activities in this project specifically target domains known to enhance self-efficacy and provide opportunities for students to cultivate a strong sense of personal identity in STEM. This project will evaluate the effects that STEMLA’s mentorship supports have on psychosocial determinants of persistence in STEM via a longitudinal study. Additional evaluation will examine the effects of the program on academic performance and graduation rate. Outcomes of this project include academic performance of Fellows that is on-par with their not-low-income peers, a strong sense of STEM identity, self-efficacy, and belonging, and persistence in STEM through graduation. Finally, the development of guiding principles in inclusive strategies in STEM career mentorship, lab mentorship and field work, in addition to the efficacy data generated by the study of these interventions, will be disseminated to the K-16 community via workshops, and publications. Importantly, these outputs will provide a framework for other colleges and universities to effect institutional transformation that seeks to empower women and low-income students to belong, thrive, and persist in 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 studentsThis 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.