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1. Board 354: Organizational Partnerships S-STEM Research Hub

   Knight, D. B. ( June 2023 , ASEE Annual Conference proceedings)

   The objective of the Research on Organizational Partnerships in Education and STEM (ROPES) Hub is to advance understanding of organizational partnerships that support academic pathways for domestic low-income engineering students. Partnerships across the education system are essential for improving STEM; achieving the systematic, structural, or sustainable change desired by programs such as NSF’s Scholarships for STEM Students (S-STEM) program is seldom achieved by individual isolated units and often requires partnerships across silos within an academic institution (i.e., intra-institution partnerships) and across institutions (i.e., inter-institution partnerships). However, how such partnerships are built, designed, and sustained remains a great challenge facing the field. This Hub, led by a collaborative team from Virginia Tech, Weber State University, Northern Virginia Community College, and the University of Cincinnati, is working to organize groups to conduct research focused on supporting low-income undergraduate engineering, computer science, and computing students in ways that are congruent with the institutional context and resources while going beyond the direct impact on S-STEM Scholars to impact departments and institutions involved. We are zooming in on the institutional infrastructure and collaborative work between researchers, administrators and practitioners, and policymakers. The overarching research question guiding the hub is: How can intra- and inter-institutional partnerships be designed, built, and sustained to systematically support low-income engineering student success? Answering this question requires a research hub because understanding different models of organizational partnerships—and linking such research to student outcomes across a variety of institutional contexts—requires a focus across S-STEM programs that is only enabled by a research hub approach; it cannot happen in a single S-STEM program. An important contribution of this work will be to characterize aspects of problems in which collaboration and partnerships can be most helpful—supporting low-income engineering students aiming to earn a bachelor’s degree fits these conditions, representing the kind of complex system of interacting, interdependent stakeholders with differing expertise and with no systematic organization of stakeholders. 

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2. Broadening equity through recruitment: Pre-college STEM program recruitment in literature and practice.

   Delale-O'Connor, L. ; A. Allen ; M. Ball ; D. N. Boone ; R. Gonda, J ; Iriti ; Slinskey Legg, A. ( January 2021 , Connected science learning)

   The National Science Foundation (2019) points to Black, Hispanic/Latino, American Indian, Alaskan Native, Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Island peoples as underrepresented in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) college majors and professional pathways. This underrepresentation results from an interplay of representation and process, meaning that it in part results from STEM opportunities and programming that do not reflect the experiences of racially and ethnically diverse people, offer insight into the needs of diverse communities, nor address barriers that prevent participation (McGee 2020). One way that institutions of higher education (IHEs) and community organizations try to address inequities in STEM is through pre-college programs aimed at supporting racially and ethnically minoritized (REM) youth. These pre-college STEM programs (PCSPs) work to foster increased STEM awareness and support students in achieving academic milestones that make college pathways more viable. Out-of-school learning (OSL) and informal STEM programming have the potential to fill gaps in STEM K–12 education, as well as complement and support connections with K–12 STEM by offering REM youth opportunities to connect STEM with their lives and influence both their capabilities and dispositions toward STEM (Kitchen et al. 2018). Studies have pointed to positive connections between OSL STEM participation and outcomes such as high school graduation, sustained interest in STEM, and matriculation to university (Penuel, Clark, and Bevan 2016). PCSPs may also support IHE’s development of infrastructure to increase admissions of REM students into college STEM programs. For PCSPs to be an effective element of reducing inequities in STEM, they must successfully engage with and recruit REM youth to participate. In this article, we focus on the recruitment of REM youth into STEM OSL to better understand what is effective for REM youth and their families, as well as highlight connections between OSL and in-school STEM opportunities. Our goals in this work are to (1) identify program practices with the aim of broadening STEM educational and career pathways for REM youth and (2) support strengthened pathways between STEM in K–12 schools and IHEs. 

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3. Emerging Voices of Tribal Perspectives in Water Resources

   Chief, K. ( April 2018 , Journal of contemporary water research & education)

   Tribal perspectives in water resources and education are often overlooked. Only recently, the field of hydrologic sciences began to include people in conducting science (Sivapalan et al. 2012) and to value indigenous perspectives with western science (Huntington 2002; Redsteer et al. 2012). The April 2018 issue of Journal of Contemporary Water Research & Education (JCWRE) explores emerging voices in tribal communities related to water resources quality and quantity and impacts to tribal water resources such as climate change and water use. This special issue begins with three foundational papers, providing a baseline understanding on water quality regulation, water quality disparities, and tribal economies as they relate to water settlements. The special issue features articles focusing on various water challenges facing tribes and the role of tribal colleges in addressing these challenges. There are less than 0.3% of Native American graduate students and post-doctorates in Science and Engineering and only a handful in hydrologic sciences and related sciences (NCSES 2016). While tribal lands are rich in natural resources and have significant water challenges (Cozetto et al. 2007; Smith and Frehner 2010), it is very unique that 67% of the lead authors are Native American including three Native American faculty, three Native American graduate students, and one Tribal College and University (TCU) Faculty. A deep discussion on water challenges facing tribes and Native American scientists working on these challenges are emerging voices of tribal perspectives in water resources. 

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4. ACCESS in STEM: An S-STEM Project Supporting Economically Disadvantaged STEM-Interested Students in Their First Two Years

   Cline, E ; Abraham, M ; Alaei, S ; Dillon, H ; Dinglasan-Panlilio, J ; Heller, J ; Kmail, Z ; Lee, S ; Ma, E ; Nahmani, M ; et al ( June 2023 , ASEE annual conference exposition)

   Achieving Change in our Communities for Equity and Student Success (ACCESS) in STEM at the University of Washington Tacoma started as a Track 1 S-STEM program in 2018 and has supported 69 students to date. This year we received Track 2 funding and welcomed our fifth cohort to campus, with funding to support ~32 additional students through 2026. University of Washington Tacoma is an Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-serving institution (AANAPISI), and we serve a high proportion of racial minority and first generation college students. Our ACCESS scholars are pursuing bachelor’s degrees in Mathematics, Environmental Science, Biomedical Sciences, Information Technology, Computer Science and Systems, Computer Engineering and Systems, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Civil Engineering, with Computer Science and Engineering representing over 60% of ACCESS scholars to date. First-time college students and first-year transfer students receive full scholarships for their first two years, and partial scholarships for their third and fourth years. The project includes an optional Early Fall Math course to enhance entry into STEM majors, and participants are able to engage in a Research Experience or project-based Introduction to Engineering course in their first year. Coupled with individual faculty mentoring and an on-campus STEM living learning community, the quarterly Success in STEM seminar course helps scholars form a cohesive community through group mentoring, as well as develop a sense of belonging, identity, and empowerment to transform the culture of STEM. This program is distinguished by its focus on pre-STEM majors in their first and second years on campus, and includes mentor training for ~30-40 faculty in teaching and mentoring diverse student populations, thus impacting all students in our majors. Our goal was to evaluate the effectiveness of a program that focuses on the first two years of college and provides financial support, courses to introduce students to research and project-based engineering, and intensive mentoring in increasing retention and academic success for Computer Science and Engineering (CS+E) students, and whether this program helps to close equity gaps for CS+E students who are low socioeconomic status (SES), underrepresented minorities (URMs), female, and/or first generation in college (First Gen) students. We compared our student scholars to a comparison group of students who met eligibility requirements but did not participate in the program. Program scholars had higher first and second year retention, and had significantly higher GPAs. The pandemic resulted in significant social, emotional, and economic stresses for our program scholars, which may have heightened the impact of the ACCESS in STEM program. 

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5. Work in Progress: Alternative Developmental Math Curriculum Designed to Accelerate the Sequential Coursework by Implementing Quantitative Reasoning

   Parker, Michael Maloy ; Nelson, Lori ; Mattes, Josh ; Pieri, Robert V. ; Allard, Austin James ; Vallie, Ann ; Allery, Teri Ann ; Haefner, Karl ( June 2019 , 2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition , Tampa, Florida)

   The current state of math education at a tribal college / university, TCU, will be presented, particularly with respect to entry into STEM majors. The alternative developmental math curriculum offered at a TCU institution using a modified pedagogical delivery system offers sound mathematical principals based on life-skills with relevant problem-solving, while explicitly addressing other holistic needs of the student such as math anxiety, persistence, mindset, and the value of collaboration (group work). This cooperative work is intended to create a community of learning which is in tune with traditional Native American cultural practices. Students learn to be responsible for their learning, engage in team work, and develop a “can-do” attitude towards mathematics. Implementation of two separate approaches at two separate institutions will be presented. 

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