Supporting Student Agency in Undergraduate Biomedical Education

摘要 黑人，拉丁裔，美国土著和太平洋岛民学生在生物医学领域仍然代表不足 专业和研究生涯。这个问题的部分原因是，科学课程和职业是在 不符合URM学生的社会身份和价值观方面的方式。URM学生（特别是 女URM学生）觉得他们不属于或“冒名顶替者”在科学，特别是当相比， 代表性良好（WR）的白色和亚洲学生（特别是WR男生）。支持学生代理机构是 一个有前途的创新战略，可以解决这些问题。初生但不断增长的相关性， 实验研究表明，支持学生的自主取向有可能改变 学生的科学动机和科学课的主观经验方面，以及教师的 实践和课堂气氛，使URM学生提供的科学教育保持一致 他们的目标和身份。本次调查的目的是检查一个有效的 旨在促进不同大学生在入门课中的代理取向的干预 生物医学专业的必修课采用纵向、随机分组、阳性对照实验（N~90 班级和6，750名学生）将在多所大学进行测试，以验证假设， 促进代理人取向的干预（即，培养学生采用可塑性思维， 科学动机和课堂环境，并使用各种代理参与策略）支持 学生最初的坚持和成就的生物医学科学通过心理和环境 （目标1），以及这些进程在开始后4年内的持续存在和成就。 干预研究（目标2）。坚持和成就结果包括课程成绩，GPA，课程- 采取，生物医学学位的获得，和职业/研究生课程的意图。近端过程变量 包括学生的代理心态，参与，兴趣，心理需求，自我效能，身份， 感知归属感，冒名顶替者的信念，和授权，以及课堂激励气候报告， 意见。包括一个条件相结合的学生为中心的代理定向干预， 对科学教师进行培训干预，鼓励学生的能动性、自主性和动机， 提供机会，审查培训教师的额外好处， 以学生为中心的干预（目标3）。最后，这项大型、有力的干预研究将允许 测试的假设，代理定向干预将是同样或更有效的URM与 WR学生和探索干预效果的程度不同，取决于其他特征 学生（例如，性别、第一代、个性、价值观）和课堂（教员的心态和 动机方法、班级规模、种族气候）（目标4）。这项研究是创造成本的关键一步- 和时间效率，可扩展的干预，以支持学生在生物医学科学的坚持。

ABSTRACT Black, Latinx, American Indigenous, and Pacific Islander students remain underrepresented in biomedical majors and research careers. Some of this problem is because science courses and careers are presented in ways that do not align with aspects of URM students’ social identities and values. URM students (particularly female URM students) feel like they do not belong or are “imposters” in science, especially when compared to well-represented (WR) white and Asian students (particularly male WR students). Bolstering student agency is a promising and innovative strategy that could address these issues. Nascent but growing correlational and experimental research suggests that supporting students’ orientation for agency has the potential to shift aspects of student motivation for science and subjective experience in science classes, as well as instructors’ practice and classroom climate, bringing the science education that URM students are provided into alignment with their goals and identities. The purpose of this investigation is to examine the effectiveness of an intervention designed to promote an agentic orientation among diverse college students in introductory classes required in biomedical science majors. A longitudinal, cluster-randomized, active control experiment (N~90 classes and 6,750 students) across multiple universities will be conducted to test the hypothesis that an intervention promoting an agentic orientation (i.e., training students to adopt a malleable mindset of their science motivation and classroom environment and use a variety of agentic engagement strategies) supports students’ initial persistence and achievement in biomedical science via psychological and environmental processes (Aim 1), as well as their sustained persistence and achievement up to 4 years following the start of the intervention study (Aim 2). Persistence and achievement outcomes include course grades, GPA, course- taking, biomedical degree obtainment, and career/graduate program intentions. Proximal process variables include reports of students’ agentic mindset, engagement, interest, psychological needs, self-efficacy, identity, perceived belonging, imposter beliefs, and empowerment, as well as classroom motivating climate reports and observations. The inclusion of a condition combining the student-focused agentic orientation intervention with a training intervention for science instructors on encouraging students’ agency, autonomy, and motivation will provide the opportunity to examine the added benefit of training teachers over and above the benefits of the student-focused intervention alone (Aim 3). Finally, this large, well-powered intervention study will allow for testing of the hypothesis that an agentic orientation intervention will be equally or more effective for URM vs. WR students and exploration of the extent to which intervention effects vary depending on other characteristics of students (e.g., gender, first-generation, personality, values) and the classroom (instructors’ mindset and motivational approach, class size, racial climate) (Aim 4). This research is a critical step toward creating a cost- and-time-efficient, scalable intervention to support student persistence in biomedical sciences.