This research paper describes the experiences of freshman STEM students arriving on a college campus for the first time after nearly a year and a half of online learning in high school. Fall 2021 marked the return of in-person learning in higher education, grown from a belief in and commitment to the value of interactions only achieved in such context (Sabella, 2021). First-year programs across the country welcomed first-time-in-college (FTIC) freshmen, many of whom experienced lower levels of social, emotional, and academic well-being due to extended periods of online learning in their final years of high school (Duckworth, et al., 2021). This reality, for some students, represented an unfamiliar learning environment to be negotiated in understanding their multiplying and evolving spaces as learners (e.g., Sequeira & Dacey, 2020).
This qualitative study sought to understand the aspects and ways in which FTIC freshmen in a STEM student success program experienced a face-to-face first semester of college following an extended period of online learning, and how these experiences shaped a sense of belonging toward identity development, both as a college student in general and as a STEM major in particular. To explore these ideas, longitudinal qualitative data were collected through a series of focus groups in the fall of 2021. Participating students had substantial identified financial need and received scholarship support as part of the program. They also had the opportunity to participate as a cohort in intentionally designed curricular and co-curricular activities aimed at supporting their academic journey toward successful completion of a STEM degree.
Findings suggest that physical space (e.g., the library and other specific locations on campus) played a disproportionate role in creating a sense of belonging for students. The results of this project add important nuance to the sense of belonging and identity development literature by expanding our understanding of the ways place, context, and prior experiences may uniquely intersect to ultimately influence belonging and identity in college.
Keywords: STEM Identity, COVID, First-Year Experience, Sense of Belonging
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Online and on-campus transfer students experienced different impacts from the pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic caused extensive disruption to higher education, highlighting the negative impacts of emergency shift to online instruction. As a result, advantages of intentionally designed, online programs in higher education were overshadowed during the pandemic. Furthermore, socioeconomic disparities were exacerbated during the pandemic which extended to STEM undergraduate transfer students, who are more likely to be low-income, from historically underrepresented groups, older, and first generation in their family to attend college. To better understand the impact of the pandemic on STEM undergraduates, including those in an intentionally designed online program, ordinal regression analysis of 352 student survey respondents enrolled in a life sciences major at a large, R1 institution in the United States spring 2020 through fall 2021 was performed. Three student types are compared: on-campus, first-time in college (FTIC); on-campus transfer (OC-TR); and online transfer (ONL-TR) students. The latter group receives all course delivery online, whereas on-campus student groups received predominately in-person course delivery prior to the pandemic. ONL-TR students were over six times less likely to report negative educational impact compared to on-campus students, FTIC and OC-TR, while controlling for parent education, income, gender, race/ethnicity, and GPA. Additional survey items further explored this result and were validated with academic records and thematic analysis of students’ text responses. A pre−/post-pandemic comparison revealed that students maintained a similar course load and GPA, despite increased perceptions of a lower GPA during the pandemic. OC-TR students were over two times more likely to express increased concern related to delayed graduation and higher frequency of feeling stress compared to FTIC and ONL-TR students. Meanwhile, low-income students were more likely to report stressors due to the pandemic’s impact on daily life, independent of student type. Taken together, students in this intentionally designed online program were more resilient to the educational and emotional impacts of the pandemic compared to on-campus students. The differences between student groups warn against generalization of student impacts and suggest further research into the positive role of online learning, not just for delivery of educational content and expanding access, but for academic and emotional stability for different student populations.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1643780
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10451233
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Frontiers in Education
- Volume:
- 8
- ISSN:
- 2504-284X
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2023.1067380
