The STEM Excellence through Engagement in Collaboration, Research, and Scholarship (SEECRS) project at Whatcom Community College is in year four of a five-year NSF S-STEM funded program aiming to support academically talented students with demonstrated financial need in biology, chemistry, geology, computer science, engineering, and physics. This program offered financial, academic, and professional support to three two-year cohorts of students and is in the final year of the third and final cohort of the currently funded grant cycle. The SEECRS project aimed to utilize a STEM-specific guided pathways approach to strengthen recruitment, retention, and matriculation of STEM students at the community college level. Over the course of the program 39 individuals received scholarship support.
The program supported scholarship recipients through participation in the SEECRS Scholars Academy, a multi-pronged approach to student support combining elements of community building, faculty mentorship, targeted advising activities, authentic science practice, and social activities. Key elements of the program are: a required two-credit course that emphasized STEM identity development, course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) in Biology, Chemistry and Engineering courses, funded summer research opportunities, and paring of each scholar with a faculty mentor.
This paper presents data from the first four years of the program including participant outcomes and feedback on their experiences. Results from project evaluation activities such as pre and post surveys, focus groups, exit interviews, and faculty surveys are also presented and analyzed to compare how gains reported by program participants regarding such attributes as their STEM identities and sense of belonging compare to responses from a control group of students who did not participate in the program. Preliminary identification of some program best practices will also be presented.
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Is Community Relevance Enough? Civic and Science Identity Impact of Microbiology CUREs Focused on Community Environmental Justice
Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) often involve a component where the outcomes of student research are broadly relevant to outside stakeholders. We wanted to see if building courses around an environmental justice issue relevant to the local community would impact students’ sense of civic engagement and appreciation of the relevance of scientific research to the community. In this quasi-experimental study, we assessed civic engagement and scientific identity gains ( N = 98) using pre- and post-semester surveys and open-ended interview responses in three different CUREs taught simultaneously at three different universities. All three CURES were focused on an environmental heavy metal pollution issue predominantly affecting African–Americans in Birmingham, Alabama. While we found increases in students’ sense of science efficacy and identity, our team was unable to detect meaningful changes in civic engagement levels, all of which were initially quite high. However, interviews suggested that students were motivated to do well in their research because the project was of interest to outside stakeholders. Our observations suggest that rather than directly influencing students’ civic engagement, the “broadly relevant” component of our CUREs engaged their pre-existing high levels of engagement to increase their engagement with the material, possibly influencing gains in science efficacy and science identity. Our observations are consistent with broader community relevance being an important component of CURE success, but do not support our initial hypothesis that CURE participation would influence students’ attitudes toward the civic importance of science.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1826988
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10284501
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Frontiers in Microbiology
- Volume:
- 11
- ISSN:
- 1664-302X
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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null (Ed.)Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) are well-documented as high-impact practices that can broaden participation and success in STEM. Drawing primarily from a community-of-practice theoretical framework, we previously developed an interdisciplinary CURE course (Science Bootcamp) for STEM majors focused entirely on the scientific process. Among first-year students, Science Bootcamp leads to psychosocial gains and increased retention. In the current study, we test whether an online Science Bootcamp also improves outcomes for STEM transfer students—a group that faces “transfer shock,” which can negatively impact GPA, psychosocial outcomes, and retention. To this end, we redesigned Science Bootcamp to a two-week course for STEM transfer students to complete prior to beginning the fall semester at our four-year institution. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the course was conducted in an entirely virtual format, using primarily synchronous instruction. Despite the course being virtual, the diverse group of STEM majors worked in small groups to conduct rigorous, novel empirical research projects from start to finish, even presenting their results in a poster symposium. Assessment data confirm the compressed, online Science Bootcamp contains key CURE components—opportunities for collaboration, discovery/relevance, and iteration—and that students were highly satisfied with the course. Moreover, in line with our hypothesis, STEM transfer students who participated in the online Science Bootcamp experienced a range of psychosocial gains (e.g., belonging to STEM). In sum, these findings suggest our online Science Bootcamp promotes positive STEM outcomes, representing a highly flexible and affordable CURE that can be scaled for use at institutions of any size.more » « less
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2020.578520
