Insufficient student interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers has been identified as a pressing issue by educators and education policy makers. This retrospective cohort study examined one promising approach to reach and inspire students early on: college‐ and university‐ run high school STEM summer programs. Data were collected from 27 colleges and universities participating in the National Science Foundation's STEM Talent Expansion Program. We examined the impact of high school STEM summer program participation on end of high school career aspirations among a sample of 845 program participants and 15,002 controls. The study employed logistic regression modeling with propensity weighting to address differences in group characteristics to model the impact of programs. Results showed that students who participated in a program had 1.4 times the odds of wanting to pursue a STEM career, controlling for background characteristics. A closer look at program design revealed that students experiencing the real‐world relevance of STEM had 1.8 times the odds of aspiring to STEM careers at the end of high school compared with controls. Findings suggest that scaling up STEM summer programs and carefully designing programs to show the real‐life relevance of STEM may be an effective strategy to curtail pipeline attrition and to inspire more students to pursue STEM careers.
Enriching the REU Experience through Student-Led Outreach Activities
The benefits of undergraduate student experiences are well known. Students participating in research experience for undergraduates (REU) programs report increased skills and self-confidence, a greater sense of empowerment as learners and more motivation to pursue science or engineering careers and graduate degrees. REU programs generally aim to engage students in exciting and rewarding research and professional development experiences to motivate them to pursue careers or advanced degrees in the sciences, technology, engineering and math (STEM). Unlike most other types of summer internships, REU programs are typically very student-focused. The faculty mentors, projects, activities, seminars, tours, etc. are selected to generate a positive impact on the student participants. After many years of offering a successful REU experience, the AERIM REU program at Oakland University (OU) decided to include a K-12 outreach component to its list of REU activities. This decision was driven by the many documented benefits of service-learning programs, which not only are of value to the persons receiving the service, but also the students providing it. They also help students improve their interpersonal and communication skills and develop a better understanding of the needs of people with diverse or different backgrounds.
After pivoting to a virtual format in the summer of 2021 due the Covid-19 pandemic, the AERIM REU program was once again offered in-person in the summer of 2022, hence allowing for an outreach activity. The initial plan was to partner with a non-profit science center in the city of UU. Unfortunately, the science center was experiencing staffing changes, as well as ongoing challenges due to Covid-19, so the AERIM REU PIs had to come up with an alternative. The school of engineering and computer science at OU has a robust and active K-12 outreach program and has partnered with the RRR society to offer a summer residential STEM program, targeting under-represented minority high-school girls from the city of UU. Working in coordination with the assistant director of outreach, AERIM REU students were tasked with developing outreach activities and presentations for the camp participants. Each REU team was responsible for developing one 1-1.5 hour activity. REU students were given complete flexibility to develop their outreach activities with little faculty influence, but were encouraged to focus on hands-on activities that could relate back to their ongoing REU research projects and that would excite the camp participants about STEM. In this paper, we report on the organization and results of this initiative. Assessment results of the outreach activity will also be shared. We believe that this type of information could prove to be of value to other REU program directors and faculty seeking to organize similar programs.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1852112
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10527834
- Publisher / Repository:
- ASEE Conferences
- Date Published:
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Location:
- Baltimore , Maryland
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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Abstract -
Shepherd, Virginia L ; Chester, Ann ; Bass, Kristin M (Ed.)Sustained innovation and economic strength of the U.S depends on a greater participation of underrepresented minorities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). University-based outreach programs that serve African American and other minority populations should do more to infuse invention education in activities that engage pre-college students from these groups to motivate them to pursue STEM degrees. The Research, Discovery, and Innovation (RDI) Summer Institute is a design and science entrepreneurship program that is offered at North Carolina Central University to high school seniors who have been accepted for admission to a STEM degree program at the university. This study found the RDI Summer Institute program to be effective based on proximal outcomes of gains in composite entrepreneurial thinking skills (entrepreneurial, managerial, engineering design, and technical skills) as perceived by the participants and measured by pre- and post-surveys. Eighty-seven percent of the pre-college participants were African Americans, showed high levels of creativity and innovativeness, and presented product ideas that were conscientious in meeting their community needs. Program impact was assessed based on near-term and distal academic outcomes in college through a rigorously designed quasi-experiment which compared 31 case-control matched pairs of students who had been RDI participants and non-RDI participants. A conditional logistic regression showed first-year retention in STEM degree programs for students who had been RDI participants was five times that of students who had been non-RDI participants. Additionally, first-year STEM retention in differential comparisons favored female students, students from very low/low SES households, and students from single parent households. Also, students who had been RDI participants performed higher in STEM gatekeeper courses, and a strong positive impact of the RDI Summer Institute program was associated with higher STEM persistence even two and three years after pre-college students participated.more » « less
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In this paper we describe a joint Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) and Research Experience for Teachers (RET) program focused on energy and sustainability topics within a Materials Science and Engineering program at a public university. This program brought ten undergraduate science and engineering students and five local middle and high school teachers on campus for an 8-week research experiences working with different lab groups. Given the relatively small number of participants, we chose qualitative interviews as our primary source of data for assessing the effectiveness of this program. The participants identified numerous positive aspects of participating in the summer research program. Students appreciated the sense of community they developed with both the other participants in the research program and the other members of their lab groups. Although most of the participants did not report the summer research experience as having a strong influence on their decisions to pursue graduate school or careers involving research, they did report both being more confident in their ability to be successful as a researcher and appreciating the opportunity to learn more about the practice of engineering research in an academic setting. For the teachers involved in the program we describe how participation influenced their leadership, perceptions of adoption educational innovations, and willingness to provide more opportunities to engage their students in authentic STEM research. The participants also provided several recommendations for improvement to the summer research program. For the students, these included more materials in advance and a more streamlined onboarding process to allow them to get up to speed on their projects more quickly, consistent access to their supervisors, and work that is intellectually challenging. Suggestion from the teacher participants for improvement mostly involved requests for more guidance on how to incorporate what they were learning in their research into lessons for their classrooms. By describing this program and the successes and challenges encountered by the participants and organizers, we intend to help others considering implementing REU/RET programs or other summer research experiences to design and implement successful programs.more » « less
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Training future engineers and scientists for the research-oriented careers necessary to deliver solutions to the challenges of hypersonic flight is important task for the aerospace community at-large. A number of programs and initiatives at the University of Central Florida (UCF) contribute to this need. Among them is the Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) site framed on HYpersonic, Propulsive, Energetic, and Reusable Platforms (HYPER) an program housed withing the Center for Advanced Turbomachinery Energy Research (CATER). This residential summer program convening on the UCF main campus prepares a group of undergraduate students to pursue doctoral-level degree programs in aerospace engineering and related disciplines. During the Summer 2021, the second term of the program, HYPER hosted fourteen students. Students conducted intensive research under the guidance of faculty mentors and their graduate student assistants. To support their complete development, HYPER students participated in industry tours, software training, technical seminars, and more. This paper reports the impact of the program in its second year. Data are derived from pre- and post-experience surveys, study groups, and technical assessment activities. Feedback from the first year were implemented in the second year.more » « less
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Colleges are becoming increasingly diverse, including strengthening representation of students with disabilities in STEM (Science, Teaching, Engineering, and Math) fields; however, representation still lags behind national trends. To adapt to this changing demographic and improve representation, STEM college professors must be prepared to grant equitable access to the STEM curriculum and enhance scientific communication skills. This practice brief outlines how a college science faculty applied the Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework to improve scientific communication skills equitably among college students with diverse needs during a 10-week NSF-REU (National Science Foundation – Research Experiences for Undergraduates) at the host institution summer program during the COVID-19 pandemic. It also provides recommendations about how students with disabilities (i.e., chronic illness, chronic pain, depression, anxiety, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder [ADHD]) which may have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Applying the UDL framework increased student confidence in applying the scientific method and led to gains in students' perception of their ability to use their skills to solve scientific problems. STEM faculty can use the lessons from the NSF-REU summer program outlined in this work to develop inclusive and accessible STEM programs for students with diverse needs across the country. Moreover, this work highlights the need for STEM faculty to involve Disability Services coordinators as active members in research programs to ensure equity and inclusion.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Conference Paper:
- https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--42747
