CAREER: Valuing Education and Career Transition Opportunities Raising Student Success in Engineering

两年制大学在教育和授予美国未来的科学家和技术人员高级证书方面发挥着至关重要的作用。该职业奖支持的研究将强调两年制大学在工程教育和职业发展过程中所扮演的角色的重要性，并扩大对其的理解。然而，垂直转移中的种族和地域不平等突出了获得改变生活的教育机会的缺乏。该项目将侧重于识别独特的地理和文化资产，以使来自不同背景、地点和机会的转校前工程专业学生更成功，从而增加转校学生的数量和准备。为了使工程转学生能够访问这些信息，该项目还将开发和测试首个数字工程转学生仪表板，学生将收到自定义报告，确定资产，优势领域以及改善工程转学生资本的建议。此外，这项研究与美国国家科学基金会工程教育计划的总体目标一致，该计划的重点是探索通往和通过工程学位课程的各种途径。这项教育研究将增强工程的包容性和参与度，这也支持了美国国家科学基金会工程教育计划的重点，即培养更具创新性和包容性的技术劳动力。这个职业奖将为未来的研究提供基础，支持两年制大学、工程教育、人力资源开发和教育领导领域的交叉创新，重点是重视教育和职业过渡机会，提高学生的成功。这个CAREER提案的目的有两个方面。第一，是一项混合方法研究，通过调查有意转学的两年制大学生的地理和文化资产，创造新的知识，以增加工程转学数量和更广泛的准备。第二是将这些研究结果整合到旨在提高转校生资本的数字教育干预中，并测试这些干预措施的有效性。本研究将以Laanan的转学生资本理论为指导，并检视转学生资本的核心建构。本项目研究部分的两个研究问题是：什么是资产、因素和策略，使两年制大学生能够进入工程转学途径？资产、因素和策略在规模和/或存在上是否因学生人口、地点、院校或转学意向而异？本项目的教育部分直接整合了研究结果，并旨在回答两个额外的研究问题：数字学习工具和资源的使用如何影响转学前工程专业学生的转学结果？通过使用数字学习工具，在多大程度上可以改善来自代表性不足和弱势背景的学生的转移结果？一个多机构团队将支持该项目的实施，包括克莱姆森大学、三县技术学院、皮埃蒙特技术学院、格林维尔技术学院和南卡罗来纳州技术学院系统。该项目旨在通过改善少数族裔、低收入家庭、第一代和非传统学生获得工程教育和学士学位课程的机会来扩大参与。增加转学途径和专门为边缘化社区设计的教育创新可以改善转学结果，并对来自以前服务不佳社区的学生的大学负担能力产生积极影响。这项研究与其他转学生研究的不同之处在于，它将重点放在地理和文化资产和需求上，包括多机构数据，转学生前的重点，按亚群体分类的数据，以及对工程学科的关注。这项研究还将为增加转学生资本所需的机构支持、途径和资源提供信息，促进研究人员和从业者与政策制定者和公众的互动，并扩大利益相关者的能力，通过新的伙伴关系支持和吸引不同人群参与STEM教育。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。

Two-year colleges play a vital role in educating and awarding advanced credentials to America’s future scientists and technicians. The research supported by this CAREER award will emphasize the importance of and expand understanding of the role that two-year colleges play in the engineering education and career pipeline. Yet, racial and location inequity in vertical transfer highlight a lack of access to life changing educational opportunities. This project will focus on identifying unique geographic and cultural assets to make pre-transfer engineering students, from a variety of backgrounds, locations, and opportunities, more successful thereby increasing the number and preparedness of transfer students. To make this information accessible to engineering transfer students, this project will also develop and test a first-of-its-kind digital Engineering Transfer Student Dashboard where students will receive custom reports identifying assets, areas of strengths, and suggestions for improving engineering transfer student capital. Further, this research aligns with the overarching goals of the NSF Engineering Education program in its focus on exploring diverse pathways to and through engineering degree programs. This educational research will enhance inclusion and participation in engineering which also supports the NSF Engineering Education program’s focus on developing a more innovative and inclusive technical workforce. This CAREER award will provide a foundation for future research supporting innovation at the intersection of two-year college, engineering education, human resource development, and educational leadership fields focusing on valuing education and career transition opportunities raising student success.The purpose of this CAREER proposal is two-pronged. The first, is a mixed methods study to create new knowledge to increase engineering transfer numbers and preparedness more broadly through investigating the geographic and cultural assets of transfer intending two-year college students. The second is to integrate these research findings into digital educational interventions aimed at improving transfer student capital and to test the efficacy of those interventions. The research will be informed by Laanan’s theory of transfer student capital and examines core constructs of transfer student capital. The two research questions for the research portion of this project are: What are assets, factors, and strategies that enable access for two-year college students to engineering transfer pathways? Do assets, factors, and strategies vary in magnitude and/or presence across student demographics, location, institutions, or intention to transfer? The educational portions of this project, directly integrate findings from the research, and aim to answer two additional research questions: How does use of digital learning tools and resources impact transfer outcomes for pre-transfer engineering students? To what extent can transfer outcomes be improved, through use of digital learning tools, for students from underrepresented and disadvantaged backgrounds? A multi-institutional team will support implementation of this project including Clemson University, TriCounty Technical College, Piedmont Technical College, Greenville Technical College, and the South Carolina Technical College System. This project aims to broaden participation through improving access to engineering education and baccalaureate degree programs for underrepresented minority, low-income, first-generation, and nontraditional students. Increased transfer pathways and educational innovations specifically designed for marginalized communities can improve transfer outcomes and positively impact college affordability for students from communities not previously well served. This research is distinct from other transfer student research in its combined focus on geographic and cultural assets and needs, inclusion of multi-institutional data, pre-transfer student focus, data disaggregation by subpopulations, and disciplinary focus on engineering. This research will also inform institutional supports, pathways, and resources needed for increased transfer student capital, stimulate interaction of researchers and practitioners with policymakers and the public, and expand of stakeholder capacity to support and engage diverse populations in STEM education through new partnerships.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.