Planning: Pathways to Transforming Arctic Science Programs

这项为期一年的计划提案的主要目标是了解来自北极农村社区的学生如何发现、参与并保持参与极地科学和极地教育机会。该项目团队将与两个北极科学、技术、工程和数学（STEM）项目合作，收集并共同创造从现场教育工作者、社区成员和北极科学家的协作网络中获得的知识和见解。与来自多个项目的合作者一起，他们的目标是开发有效的北极STEM领域经验框架。这项工作的重点是实现对北极STEM中招募和留住历史上被排斥群体（heg）学生的挑战的共同理解，并旨在提出解决这些挑战的关键最佳实践。拟议的项目有可能对北极STEM项目产生重大影响，并增加农村社区学生对这些项目的参与。该项目的目标是建立一个实践社区，使北极本科生研究项目更有吸引力，更容易接触到各种各样的参与者。这项工作将侧重于了解如何更好地满足阿拉斯加原住民和其他北极社区学生的需求。拟议的工作承认土著经验和知识的交叉性和复杂性，有助于对北极挑战的细致理解。通过与土著认识论的接触，它扩大了北极研究和政策中知识创造的边界，并挑战了传统的研究范式。这项工作强调了知识系统的相互联系，在北极STEM中培养了一种更全面、更综合的知识探究方法，丰富了该领域的知识基础，提高了其创新解决问题的能力。这种方法是支持北极STEM教育项目发展的重要一步。这一努力也支持了机构间北极研究政策委员会（IARPC）教育小组的目标，该小组正在努力提高阿拉斯加土著青年在北极联邦资助的STEM项目中的参与度，并了解哪些创新是必要的，以便更好地吸引北极社区的学生。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。

The main objective of this one-year planning proposal is to understand how students from rural Arctic communities can discover, engage with, and remain involved in, Polar science and polar educational opportunities. The project team will collaborate with two Arctic Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) programs to gather and co-create knowledge and insights obtained from a collaborative network of field educators, community members and Arctic scientists. With collaborators from multiple programs, they aim to develop frameworks for effective Arctic STEM field experiences. This effort is focused on achieving a common understanding of the challenges related to recruiting and retaining students from Historically Excluded Groups (HEGs) in Arctic STEM, and it aims to propose key best practices to address these challenges. The proposed project has the potential to significantly impact Arctic STEM programs and increase the participation of students from rural communities in these programs. The project goal is to foster a community-of-practice that will make Arctic undergraduate research programs more engaging and accessible to a diverse range of participants. The effort will focus on understanding how to better serve the needs of students from Alaska Native and other Arctic communities. The proposed work acknowledges the intersectionality and complexity of Indigenous experiences and knowledge, contributing to a nuanced understanding of Arctic challenges. By engaging with Indigenous epistemologies, it expands the boundaries of knowledge creation in Arctic research and policy, and challenges traditional research paradigms. Emphasizing the interconnectedness of knowledge systems, this work fosters a more holistic and integrated approach to intellectual inquiry within Arctic STEM, enriching the field’s intellectual foundation and advancing its capacity for innovative problem-solving. This approach is an important step to support the evolution of Arctic STEM education programs. This effort also supports the goals of the Interagency Arctic Research Policy Committee (IARPC) Education Team, which is working to increase participation of Alaska Native youth in Federally-funded STEM programs in the Arctic and understand what innovations are necessary to better engage students from Arctic communities.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.