EMERGE in STEM (Education for Minorities to Effectively Raise Graduation and Employment in STEM) is a NSF INCLUDES Design and Development Launch Pilot. This project addresses the broadening participation challenge of increasing participation of women, the at-risk minority population, and the deaf in the STEM workforce. The project incorporates in and out-of-school career awareness activities for grades 4-12 in a high poverty community in Guilford County, North Carolina. EMERGE in STEM brings together a constellation of existing community partners from all three sectors (public, private, government) to leverage and expand mutually reinforcing STEM career awareness and workforce development activities in new ways by using a collective impact approach.
This project builds on a local network to infuse career exposure elements into the existing mutually reinforcing STEM activities and interventions in the community. A STEM education and career exposure software, Learning Blade, will be used to reach approximately 15,000 students. A shared measurement system and assessment process will contribute to the evaluation of the effectiveness of the collective impact strategies, the implementation of mutually reinforcing activities across the partnership and the extent to which project efforts attract students to consider STEM careers.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Gregory MontyMargaret KanipesMalcolm SchugSteven Jiang
Women continue to be underrepresented in computer science professions. In 2015, while 57% of professional occupations in the U.S. were held by women, only 25% of computing occupations were held by women. Furthermore, the share of computer science degrees going to women is smaller than any STEM field, even though technology careers are the most promising in terms of salaries and future growth. Research suggests that issues contributing to this lack of computer science participation begin early and involve complex social and environmental factors, including girls' perception that they do not belong in computer science classes or careers. Computer science instruction often alienates girls with irrelevant curriculum; non-collaborative pedagogies; a lack of opportunities to take risks or make mistakes; and a heavy reliance on lecture instead of hands-on, project-based learning. Computer science experiences that employ research-based gender equitable best practices, particularly role modeling, can help diminish the gender gap in participation. In response to this challenge, Twin Cities PBS (TPT), the National Girls Collaborative (NGC) and Code.org will lead Code: SciGirls! Media for Engaging Girls in Computing Pathways, a three-year project designed to engage 8-13 year-old girls in coding through transmedia programming which inspires and prepares them for future computer science studies and career paths. The project includes five new PBS SciGirls episodes featuring girls and female coding professionals using coding to solve real problems; a new interactive PBSKids.org game that allows children to develop coding skills; nationwide outreach programming, including professional development for informal educators and female coding professionals to facilitate activities for girls and families in diverse STEM learning environments; a research study that will advance understanding of how the transmedia components build girls' motivation to pursue additional coding experiences; and a third-party summative evaluation.
Code: SciGirls! will foster greater awareness of and engagement in computer science studies and career paths for girls. The PBS SciGirls episodes will feature girls and female computer science professionals using coding to solve real-world challenges. The project's transmedia component will leverage the television content into the online space in which much of 21st century learning takes place. The new interactive PBSKids.org game will use a narrative framework to help children develop coding skills. Drawing on narrative transportation theory and character identification theory, TPT will commission two exploratory knowledge-building studies to investigate: To what extent and how do the narrative formats of the Code: SciGirls! online media affect girls' interest, beliefs, and behavioral intent towards coding and code-related careers? The studies aim to advance understanding of how media builds girls' motivation to pursue computer science experiences, a skill set critical to building tomorrow's workforce. The project team will also raise educators' awareness about the importance of gender equitable computer science instruction, and empower them with best practices to welcome, prepare and retain girls in coding. The Code: SciGirls! Activity Guide will provide educators with a relevant resource for engaging aspiring computer scientists. The new media and guide will also reside on PBSLearningMedia.org, reaching 1.2 million teachers, and will be shared with thousands of educators across the SciGirls CONNECT and National Girls Collaborative networks. The new episodes are anticipated to reach 92% of U.S. TV households via PBS, and the game at PBSKids.org will introduce millions of children to coding. The summative evaluation will examine the reach and impact of the episodes, game and new activities. PIs will share research findings and project resources at national conferences and will submit to relevant publications. This project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments. This includes providing multiple pathways for broadening access to and engagement in STEM learning experiences, advancing innovative research on and assessment of STEM learning in informal environments, and developing understandings of deeper learning by participants.
The mixed methods randomized experimental study assessed a model of engagement and education that examined the contribution of SciGirls multimedia to fifth grade girls’ experience of citizen science. The treatment group (n = 49) experienced 2 hours of SciGirls videos and games at home followed by a 2.5 hour FrogWatch USA citizen science session. The control group (n = 49) experienced the citizen science session without prior exposure to SciGirls. Data from post surveys and interviews revealed that treatment girls, compared to control girls, demonstrated significantly greater interest in their
Computer Science (CS) education at the middle school level using educational games has seen recent growth and shown promising results. Typically these games teach the craft of programming and not the perspectives required for computational thinking, such as abstraction and algorithm design, characteristic of a CS curriculum. This research presents a game designed to teach computational thinking via the problem of minimum spanning trees to middle school students, a set of evaluation instruments, and the results of an experimental pilot study. Results show a moderate increase in minimum spanning
Games that help players develop an understanding of computer science concepts are a promising alternative to the current emphasis on programming. This workshop will introduce participants to digital and analog games that demonstrate how CS concepts can be integrated with game play and engaging story contexts. Relevant issues such as the use of player data for assessment of learning, the role of narrative in educational games, and the challenges of identifying appropriate concepts for game-based learning will also be addressed.
Computer science and its related fields are rapidly growing. However, there is a significant and rising shortage of women in this career domain. To combat this shortage, we explored the potential of coupling analog and digital games teaching computer science concepts to educate, interest, and engage female youth. For our purposes we created and used an analog and digital game both teaching the same computer science principle, image representation, in an after school program setting with middle school-aged females. Assessments were completed by the girls before and after the analog game version
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Stephanie EordanidsElisabeth GeeGail Carmichael
In support of a summative evaluation of SciGirls Season Three, Multimedia Research developed a scale to assess preteen girls’ interest in nature and science. The work was sponsored by Twin Cities PBS under NSF Grant No. 1323713. Multimedia Research developed, piloted, validated and implemented the GINSS: A nine statement Likert scale constructed to reveal girls’ strength of interest in nature and science activities. Researchers and evaluators are encouraged to use this scale to extend its application. Please email if you eventually use the scale in your research or evaluation: Flagg
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative resources for use in a variety of settings. Nationally, the US has a shortage of computer scientists; a big part of this problem is that girls are discouraged from learning computer science at a very young age. This project tries to address this problem by creating a videogame specifically oriented towards getting middle school girls interested in learning computer science concepts outside traditional programming classes. Based on evidence that stories provide a compelling way to present complicated technical subjects and that girls in particular respond to technology careers as a way to help others, the project is building a videogame called "Gram's House" in which social workers intend to move a fictional grandmother to a retirement home unless the player can outfit her home with sufficient technology for her to remain independent. Solving puzzles in the game requires learning core computer science concepts. Research studies will be conducted to determine whether the videogame is effective at getting girls interested in computer science, at teaching computer science concepts, and whether using stories makes videogames more effective for learning. This project based on an earlier successful prototype uses an iterative research-based design process including paper prototyping, playtesting, and focus groups (N=20) to create age appropriate activities, based on the CS Unplugged series, that support learning concepts from the Data, Internet, Algorithms, and Abstraction sections of the high-school level CS Principles curriculum. A quantitative, quasi-experimental design will be used to determine the overall effectiveness of teaching CS concepts under three types of game conditions: (a) games alone, (b) games with fictional settings, and (c) games with stories. A novel assessment instrument will be developed to assess content learning and qualitative observation using a standard observation protocol will be used to gauge interest and engagement. 70-80 middle school girls will be recruited for afterschool participation in the study in two states. As part of the dissemination efforts, a facilitator's guide, rule book, and materials such as maps and storyboards will be created and shared with the game. In addition, a workshop for computer science and other teachers who are interested in using games to teach CS concepts will be conducted.
Brigham Young University and the University of Maryland, in partnership with the Smithsonian Institution, the Computer History Museum, and NASA, plus leading game designers, educators, scientists, and researchers, will conduct research on the design and development of two large-scale Alternate Reality Games (ARGs) based on deep-time science in astrobiology, astrophysics, and interplanetary space travel. The project will iteratively design and test two distinct types of ARGs (closed- and open-ended) to study the effects of these ARGs on STEM learning. The ARGs will be based upon the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), affording learners with intensive, self-driven, and scaffolded scientific learning and will be aimed at attracting girls and other groups historically underrepresented in science and technology. Each ARG will be designed by NASA scientists, educators and education researchers, and game-based learning experts and will be highly interactive: engaging learners in collaborative investigations in real and virtual worlds to collect scientific data, conduct data analysis, and contribute scientific evidence that will help solve scientific questions within a science-based narrative derived from real world problems that will develop learners' computational thinking skills in a collaborative, participatory virtual learning environment. Combining data from web and social media analytics, player interviews, surveys, and user-generated content, researchers, and evaluation experts at UXR who will provide an outcomes-based evaluation, including front-end, formative, remedial, and summative evaluations, will establish the properties of ARGs that most effectively advance informal STEM learning outcomes. By comparing open-ended and closed-ended ARGs, the PIs will be able to assess the relative strengths and weaknesses of two distinct approaches to Alternate Reality Game design. The project team will test the hypothesis that open-ended, user-generated content will support inquiry-based learning, peer-to-peer learning, and life-wide and life-deep learning, while close-ended, narrative-rich ARGs will support specific transfer of STEM knowledge, collaboration, and problem solving. To help ensure that the games appeal to their target audiences, the project team will adopt co-design methods, enlisting the creative input of participating teens at each stage of the design process. Supplementary materials and lesson plans developed in close consultation with teachers, librarians, teens, and external stakeholders will enable the ARGs to be widely and effectively used as a model in museums, classrooms, libraries, and after-school programs. The proposed ARGs represent a unique environment to test learning principles that enable players to bridge their learning through transmedia across multiple contexts and test the effects of collaboration with massive numbers of concurrent players. As a result, the project should yield insights on how learning principles can be adopted and re-appropriated for emerging learning environments, including those that that might be crowd-sourced. The research is well grounded in the literature and the PIs do an excellent job of mapping ARG design principles to the pertinent learning science research, providing a clear sense of the particular affordances of the genre that should lead to new understandings. The approach has profound implications for the way we might teach the next generation of students. The ability to mix problem solving and learning in virtual spaces with experiences and data derived from the physical world could dramatically change how we understand the role of technology in education.
SciGirls CONNECT is a broad national outreach effort to encourage educators, both formal and informal, to adopt new, research-based strategies to engage girls in STEM. SciGirls (pbskids.org/scigirls) is an Emmy award-winning television program and outreach program that draws on cutting-edge research about what engages girls in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) learning and careers. The PBS television show, kids' website, and educational outreach program have reached over 14 million girls, educators, and families, making it the most widely accessed girls' STEM program available nationally. SciGirls' videos, interactive website and hands-on activities work together to address a singular but powerful goal: to inspire, enable, and maximize STEM learning and participation for all girls, with an eye toward future STEM careers. The goal of SciGirls is to change how millions of girls think about STEM. SciGirls CONNECT (scigirlsconnect.org) includes 60 partner organizations located in schools, museums, community organizations and universities who host SciGirls clubs, camps and afterschool programs for girls. This number is intended grow to over 100 by the end of the project in 2016. SciGirls CONNECT provides mini-grants, leader training and educational resources to partner organizations. Each partner training session involves educators from a score of regional educational institutions. To date, over 700 educators have received training from over 250 affiliated organizations. The SciGirls CONNECT network is a supportive community of dedicated educators who provide the spark, the excitement and the promise of a new generation of women in STEM careers. Through our partner, the National Girls Collaborative Project, we have networked educational organizations hosting SciGirls programs with dozens of female role models from a variety of STEM fields. The SciGirls CONNECT website hosts monthly webinars, a quarterly newsletter, gender equity resources, SciGirls videos and hands-on activities. SciGirls also promotes the television, website and outreach program to thousands of elementary and middle school girls and their teachers both locally and nationally at various events.
Produced by Twin Cities Public Television, St. Paul, MN, and sponsored by the National Science Foundation, SciGirls (SG) is a multimedia project for upper grade-school and middle-school tweens. Weekly half-hour episodes are tied in with web and outreach activities in the fields of science, technology and engineering. Multimedia Research, an independent evaluation group implemented a summative evaluation of the SG Season Two multimedia project. Fifth grade girls (N = 87) viewed three shows over three weeks. They could visit the SG website at any time but were required to visit and play a Pick'm
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Barbara FlaggTwin Cities Public Television
The New York Hall of Science, in collaboration with the Tufts Center for Engineering Education, the Learning Games Network, and New York City departments of education and of parks and recreation, is creating and testing two innovative science games to support student learning about frictional force and linear motion. SciGames integrates rigorous, highly motivating, data collection activities conducted in museum and playground settings, with in-depth data analysis and additional scientific investigation in the classroom. The primary goals of the SciGames project are to increase student motivation and interest in science and improve student learning about core physical science concepts. This exploratory project targets underrepresented urban students and their teachers from 20 schools in New York City (NYC) and through its partnership with NYC department of parks and recreation has great potential for scale-up throughout NYC, as well as dissemination to other urban communities. The SciGames model creates experiences for students that build on the positive, fun, free-choice learning characteristics of informal settings; promotes learning through repeated game-like experimentation and play; and supports students' sustained interest and learning in science classrooms where core concepts are formalized. The project is based on four design principles: (1) SciGames turns students' informal experiences into a game, (2) SciGames makes science content an integral part of game play, (3) SciGames generates data for further analysis during game play, and (4) SciGames, through the use of digital apps, supports students inquiring into data back in their classrooms. Researchers are developing the games using rigorous, well constructed, iterative cycles of design, development, testing, evaluation, and revision with different groups of NYC students and teachers. Pre and post data on students\' science learning and affect are being used to inform the design cycles. Over a two-year period, SciGames will produce two science games and associated digital apps, and a portable kit that supports game implementation, data collection and analysis. SciGames is an important experiment, combining the informal, engaging aspects of play with more formal science investigation to encourage and sustain the interest, participation, and learning of underrepresented students in STEM. This project has the potential to transform how we think of and structure science learning for middle school students.