The Brain Explorer Academy (BEA): An Informal Science Education Partnership

项目总结 多样性对创新和我们社会的进步至关重要。然而，尽管我们作为一个国家做出了最大的努力， 美国一直未能实现STEM劳动力多样化目标，长期以来，这被归因于 “学术管道”未能招收和留住代表不足的少数族裔的学生，a 这一现象常被描述为“管道泄漏”。应对这一挑战将需要创新的、多方面的 同时处理造成差异的社会和环境因素的综合干预措施。近期 研究表明，在大学里选择STEM专业直接受到学术互动的影响 高中，这表明参与以大学为基础的STEM教育计划可以增加招生 并将其纳入STEM学科。利用以大学为基础的学术经验参与的项目 在高中期间未得到充分教育的人可以引导他们的教育道路进入大学STEM专业。URM STEM教育的兴趣和坚持性方面的差异是由个人、 环境和学校因素。这一因素的汇合表明，改变学生成绩可能会 受益于数字互联的社会生态框架，该框架超越了个人利益和 考虑学生所处的多层次环境的能力。致信地址 面对STEM多样性的挑战，我们提出了脑探索者学院(BEA)，这是一个全面的、多年的、 社会生态非正式科学教育计划，利用神经科学灌输好奇心和培养兴趣 在STEM职业生涯中。BEA将通过多阶段干预将高中生召集到第一标题学校 这培养了人们对STEM、知识和技能发展、批判性思维、科学交流和 定量/分析能力。这项提议将我们将检验这样一个假设，即分阶段的方法 BEA从第一年的高度结构化学习发展到第二年的高度个性化指导 第三年，将导致以下可量化的结果：(1)能力发展：BEA将增强 科学学习经验，以提高量化、分析、批判性思维和团队能力 科学和科学交流技能；(2)知识、态度和实践：BEA将提高兴趣 并积极改变对STEM学科和健康相关研究中潜在职业的态度；以及 (3)劳动力能力建设：东亚银行将提高服务不足学生的招生成功率 社区到大学STEM专业的学生。除了使用独立的第三方评估该计划之外 评估者，我们将生成一个数字和材料资源库，用于创建一个“计划中的-在-- 可在其他机构广泛实施、不断改进和复制的“盒子”。

PROJECT SUMMARY Diversity is critical to innovation and the advancement of our society. Yet despite our best efforts as a nation, the United States has not been able to achieve STEM workforce diversity goals, which have been long attributed to the failure of the “academic pipeline” to recruit and retain students from underrepresented minorities (URM), a phenomenon often described as a “leaky pipeline”. Addressing this challenge will require innovative, multi- pronged interventions that concurrently address social and environmental contributors to disparities. Recent studies have shown that choosing a STEM major in college is directly influenced by academic interactions during high school, suggesting that involvement in a college-based STEM education program can enhance recruitment and retention into STEM disciplines. Programs that use a college-based academic experiences to engage underserved individuals during high school can steer their educational path to college STEM majors. URM disparities in the interest and persistence in STEM education are driven by the combination of individual, environmental and school factors. This confluence of factors suggests that changing student outcomes could benefit from a digitally-interconnected social ecological framework that goes beyond individual interests and competencies to consider the the multi-level environment within which the student learner is situated. To address the challenges in STEM diversity, we propose the Brain Explorer Academy (BEA), a comprehensive, multi-year, socio-ecological informal science education program that uses neuroscience to instill curiosity and foster interest in STEM careers. The BEA will marshal high school students in a Title 1 School through a multi-stage intervention that fosters interest in STEM, knowledge and skill development, critical thinking, scientific communication, and quantitative/analytical competencies. The proposal will We will test the hypothesis that the staged approach of the BEA, which proceeds from highly structured learning in the first year, to highly individualized mentoring in the third year, will lead to the following quantifiable outcomes: (1) Competency development: BEA will augment the science learning experience to enhance competencies in quantitative, analytical, critical thinking, team science and scientific communication skills; (2) Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices: BEA will increase interest and positively modify attitudes towards STEM disciplines and potential careers in health-related research; and (3) Workforce Capacity Building: BEA will increase the success of recruitment of students from underserved communities to college STEM majors. In addition to evaluating the program using an independent third-party evaluator , we will generate a repository of digital and material resources to be used to create a “program-in-a- box” that can be widely implemented, constantly improved and reproduced at other institutions.