The intent of this five-year project is to design, deliver, and study professional development for Informal Science Learning (ISL) educators in the arena of equity-focused STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics) teaching and learning. While the strategy of integrating art and science to promote interest, identity, and other STEM-related learning has grown in recent years, this domain is still nascent with respect to a guiding set of best practices. Through prior work, the team has developed and implemented a set of design principles that incorporate effective practices for broadening participation of girls in science via science-art integration on the topic of the biology, chemistry and optics of "Colors in Nature." The continued initiative would impact the ISL field by providing a mechanism for ISL educators in museums, libraries and after-school programs to adopt and implement these STEAM design principles into their work. The team will lead long-term (12-18 months) professional development activities for ISL educators, including: 1) in-person workshops that leverage their four previously developed kits; 2) online, asynchronous learning activities featuring interactive instructional videos around their STEAM design principles; 3) synchronous sessions to debrief content and foster communities of practice; and 4) guided design work around the development or redesign of STEAM activities. In the first four years of the project, the team will work with four core institutional partners (Sitka Sound Science Center, Sno-Isle Libraries, the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District after-school program, and the Pima County Public Library system) across three states (Alaska, Washington, and Arizona). In the project's later stages, they will disseminate their learning tools to a broad, national audience. 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 project has three main goals: (1) To support ISL educators in offering meaningful STEAM activities, (2) To create institutional change among the partner organizations, and (3) To advance the ISL field with respect to professional development and designing for STEAM Programming. The research questions associated with the professional development activities address the ways in which change occurs and focus on all three levels: individual, institutional, and the ISL field. The methods are qualitative and quantitative, including videotaped observations, pre and post interviews, surveys and analysis of online and offline artifacts. In addition, the project evaluation will assess the implementation of the project's professional development model for effectiveness. Methods will include observations, interviews, surveys and Website analytics and program data.
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program 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 goal of this project is to make 21st century quantum science comprehensible and engaging to non-expert informal adult learners. This project has strong potential to add new knowledge about the public's perception and understanding of quantum physics. This scientific content is often difficult for informal audiences to grasp, and there are relatively few accessible learning resources for a non- professional audience. The development of this online, interactive resource with short animations, graphics, and simulations has strong potential to fill this gap. It will develop a visually driven online resource to engage non-expert audiences in understanding the basics of quantum physics. The web design will be modular, incorporating many multimedia elements and the structure will be flexible allowing for future expansion. All content would be freely available for educational use. There is potential for extensive reach and use of the resources by informal adult learners online as well as learners in museums, science centers, and schools. Project partners are the Joint Quantum Institute at the University of Maryland and the National Institute of Standards and Technology, College Park. An independent evaluation of the project will add new knowledge about informal learners' perceptions and/or knowledge about quantum science and technology. An initial needs assessment via focus groups with the general public will be designed to find out more about what they already know about quantum physics topics and terminology, as well as what they want to know and what formats they prefer (games, simulations, podcasts, etc.). In person user testing will be used with early versions of the project online resource using a structured think-aloud protocol. Later in year 1 and 2, online focus groups with the general public will be conducted to learn what they find engaging and what they learned from the content. Iterative feedback from participants during the formative stage will guide the development of the content and format of the online resources. The Summative Evaluation will gather data using a retrospective post-survey embedded with a pop-up link on the Atlas followed by interviews with a subset of online users. Google Analytics will be used to determine the breadth and depth of their online navigation, what resources they download, and what websites they visit afterward. A post-only survey of undergraduate and graduate students who participated in resource development will focus on changes in students' confidence around their science communication skills and level of quantum physics understanding.
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative research, approaches and resources for use in a variety of settings. The project will conduct research designed to deepen our fundamental knowledge about culture, experience, and ecosystems cognition and to develop innovative practices and approaches to support learning about changing ecological systems and environmental decision making. Work on cultural differences in the production of complex systems knowledge is severely lacking. This gap in knowledge may contribute to the continued reproduction of inequities in science education. More broadly findings from this project will have clear implications for theories of cognitive development, especially those pertaining to how knowledge is shaped by culture and experience. Focusing on ecosystems may represent an opportunity to not only increase engagement and achievement in science among non-dominant communities and Native youth specifically, but also advance effective learning for all communities. The primary deliverables for the project are conference presentations and research publications. However, the project will also develop additional resources freely available to researchers, educators, and the general public. These will include summer curricular materials and teaching tools, professional development workshops, practitioner briefs about research findings that can be used in professional development workshops and shared share more broadly, and evaluation reports.
A deeper understanding of cultural influences on conceptions of the natural world can serve to advance the educational needs of children, including children from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds. Project research will include two interrelated series of studies designed to expand knowledge about human cognition of complex ecosystems and the affordances of informal STEM learning environments in developing and supporting the critical 21st century skill of ecological systems level reasoning. The first consists of a series of experiments focused on ecological cognition and the role of humans in nature. The second consists of design-based research interventions in informal settings, summer workshops for youth and the communities, focused on ecological systems level thinking and socio-environmental decision making. The project will recruit and engage both child and adult participants from two broad cultural communities, Native Americans and European Americans living in urban and suburban communities, in part because it affords a sharp test of human-nature relations. Sampling from two different urban communities will avoid simple Native-non-Native comparative binaries and to conduct Native-to-Native comparative analysis. Based on results from this, the project will result in: 1) foundational knowledge about human learning and reasoning and ecosystems and environmental decision making, 2) culturally responsive models of learning and practice about complex ecosystems for indoors and outdoors informal learning environments, and 3) insights about research-practice-community partnerships. One important objective of the research is to broaden participation and close opportunity gaps for under-represented groups in STEM fields broadly and more specifically for Indigenous people. Members of Indigenous communities, who provide strong role models for other aspiring scholars, will be involved as postdoctoral fellows, research assistants and graduate fellows.
Polar Extremes: Enhancing Experiential Digital Learning is an integrated media and research project produced by the PBS science series, NOVA, that will bring polar science to informal learners through traditional storytelling and experiential, digital learning environments. Stark, cold, and seemingly frozen in time, the top and bottom of the Earth feel other-worldly, completely removed from our everyday existence. Yet, nothing could be further from the truth. The Arctic and Antarctic exert profound influence over our entire planet. Disturbances in these icy realms can send transformative ripples around the globe, altering the circulation of the atmosphere and oceans, and affecting every form of life. And although the poles might seem constant and everlasting, they--like our planet--are always changing, with a deep and complex past. NOVA will provide informal science learners access to specialized research happening at the ends of the earth, introducing them to today's scientists exploring the major drivers of the climate, uncovering the deep history of past paleoclimates, or perfecting climate and weather models. The project includes: a 2-hour nationally broadcast PBS documentary (working title Polar Extremes); a NOVA Polar Lab, an experiential interactive learning platform on polar science; and a Polar Exploration Initiative consisting of a 10-part YouTube series, a collection of 360 videos, virtual field trips, and social media reporting "on location" from Antarctica, along with other polar-themed video, radio and digital journalism. It also includes a research program conducted in collaboration with the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) to study how narrative-driven and experiential learning can foster informal learning in polar science across a diverse array of audiences. NOVA, the most popular science program on television, with a robust digital presence, will bring current polar science to millions. NOVA will use a range of media to transport viewers to remote polar locations, to interact with polar scientists, manipulate polar data, or vicariously explore the frozen tundra--using a mix of learning approaches. This project will develop and test the impact of two forms of informal learning: traditional narrative-driven storytelling and active, experiential learning. Both components will be developed through audience research, formative evaluation or pilot testing, and experiments. The overarching goal is to determine the best way to combine and leverage traditional and interactive media technologies to educate the public about polar science. How can these modes enhance learning outcomes? The study uses the Informal Science Learning "strand framework" developed by the National Research Council in Learning Science in Informal Environments: People, Places, and Pursuits (2009). Because different age groups and socioeconomic backgrounds may engage differently with different types of learning materials and platforms, the project components are designed to test a variety of different learning approaches, with different audiences. This study will be one of the first to address the relative efficacy of various forms of experiential education and whether active versus vicarious experiential learning depends on the characteristics of the learners. As engagement technologies continue to evolve, this project will help inform how to best design and apply them effectively. The project will apply these new lessons specifically to present polar research to the public and to offer audiences an opportunity to explore and learn about these remote regions in new ways that bring them to life, make them relevant, and enhance learning outcomes. 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 project has co-funding support from the Office of Polar Programs (OPP).
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Paula ApsellLisa LeombruniJulia CortHunter Gehlbach
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program 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. This project will embed public engagement with science (PES) into the cultures and practices of two Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites: the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in New Hampshire and the Harvard Forest in Massachusetts. The goals are 1) to build knowledge about the mutual learning between scientists and adult stakeholders in face-to-face engagement setting and 2) to develop evidence-based practices in the content of place-based ecosystem research. This is a collaborative project of 3 universities (Michigan State University, Harvard, and CUNY) and the two LTERs. Two primary research questions guide this work. First, how willing are participating scientists to take part in PES? What are their attitudes and beliefs about whether engagement can be effective and whether they have the necessary skills? Second, how willing are participating scientists to build relationships with stakeholders using normed tactics? Both qualitative and quantitative methods will be used to collect evidence including semi-structured interviews and surveys. A general set of hypothesis include that there will be positive changes in LTER scientists willingness to participate in PES, attitudes, and efficacy beliefs.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
John BesleySarah GarlickPeter GroffmanPamela TemplerKathleen Lambert
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.
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative research, approaches and resources for use in a variety of settings. Blind youth are generally excluded from STEM learning and careers because materials for their education are often composed for sighted individuals. In this proposed Innovations in Development project, the PIs suggest that spatial acuity is an important element in order for blind persons to understand physical and mental structures. Thus, in this investigation, efforts will be made to educated blind youth in the discipline of engineering. A total of 200 blind students, ages 12-20 along with 30 informal STEM educators will participate in the program. This effort is shared with the National Federation of the Blind, Utah State University, the Science Museum of Minnesota, and the Lifelong Learning Group.
The National Federation of the Blind, in partnership with scholars from Utah State University and educators from the Science Museum of Minnesota will develop a five-year Innovations in Development project in order to broaden the participation of blind students in STEM fields through the development of instruction and accessible tools that assess and improve the spatial ability of blind youth. The partnership with the Science Museum will facilitate the creation of informal science content for students and professional development opportunities for informal educators. Evaluation will be conducted by Lifelong Learning Group of the Columbus Center of Science and Industry. Activities will begin in year one with a week-long, engineering design program for thirty blind high-school students at the Federation of the blind headquarters in Baltimore. Year two will feature two similarly sized programs, taking place at the Science Museum. While spatial ability is linked to performance in science, research has not been pursued as to how that ability can be assessed, developed, and improved in blind youth. Further, educators are often unaware of ways to deliver science concepts to blind students in a spatially enhanced manner, and students do not know how to advocate for these accommodations, leading blind youth to abandon science directions. Literature on the influences of a community of practice on youth with disabilities, as well as nonvisual tools for experiencing engineering, is lacking. This project will advance understanding of how blind people can participate in science, and how spatial ability can be developed and bolstered through informal engineering activities and an existing community of practice.
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds innovative research, approaches and resources for use in a variety of settings.The project plans to develop evidence-based principles to guide citizen science project owners in the coordinated management of project participants within the SciStarter landscape. SciStarter is a repository of over 1,500 citizen science (CS) projects. Through prior research, SciStarter 2.0 tools were developed which can be used to study and coordinate recruitment and retention strategies across projects. Coordinated management has the potential to deepen volunteer learning and growth and benefit project goals because it can address across-project skew (CS volunteers involved in multiple projects), evolving motivations, seasonal gaps, untapped synergies across projects, and other unanticipated factors that cannot be addressed via management within project silos. The project will increase the capacity of citizen science projects to achieve their myriad scientific, learning and conservation goals through enhanced coordination of volunteer management, facilitated by evidence-based guidance from the SciStarter's User's Manual for Project Owners. The findings of the research will guide project design and implementation towards synergies that increase the capacity of projects to generate scientific, learning, and conservation outcomes. Research about citizen scientists has focused on within-project assessments and comparisons of projects, but few have examined dynamics of recruitment, retention, and movement of individuals across projects. SciStarter is designed for embedded tracking of participation dynamics in a landscape of projects. The project will expand embedded assessment to measure scientific, learning, and conservation outcomes and their links to participation dynamics within and across projects. Through social network analysis, the project will describe patterns of bridges, ties, and distances among projects based on the cross-over of participants. The project will also propose qualitative research to understand project managers' perceptions of SciStarter and the costs and benefits of coordinated management of citizen scientists. The research is designed to provide insights into participation dynamics that will lead to subsequent knowledge building across citizen science projects, and determine whether new evidence about advantages and disadvantages of coordinated management will persuade project owners to rely less on the silo approach to volunteer management.
Becoming computationally literate is increasingly crucial to everyday life and to expanding workforce capacity. Research suggests that computational literacy--knowing what, when, how, and why to use the ideas of computer science, in combination with the capacity to view problems and potential solutions through the lens of computational structures and procedures--can be supported through digital game play. This project aims to develop a social and creative exhibit game that foregrounds aspects of computer science, specifically artificial intelligence (AI) and computer programming, in ways that enable youth to explore, construct, and share computational complex systems content with one another and other museum visitors. To play the game, pairs of youth visitors will use code cards to program the behavior of AI animals in a virtual forest. As they do so, youth will engage with computational literacy practices, such as basic computer programming, describing their computational ideas, and doing computational problem solving with their friends. Their activity will be projected on a large screen as a strategy for enabling youth to test, rehearse, and communicate their computational ideas and to also interest other visitors into computational problem solving.
Using multi-perspective and iterative design-based research, university learning scientists, museum practitioners, and game developers will pursue research questions around how science museums can better engage youth who are traditionally underrepresented in computer science in complex computational practices. Data sources will include interactive-log data, observations of visitor interactions with the game, visitor interviews, and visitor surveys. A multimodal and mixed methods approach that searches for convergences between qualitative analysis, quantitative analysis, and learning analytics will be used to generate research findings. Changes in computational literacy will be assessed by evaluating what problems visitors choose to solve with programming, how they frame those problems, and their selections from among possible solutions, what they program, how they program, and how they describe programming ideas. The results of this project will include: 1) a social, interactive gameplay experience that supports the development of computational literacy; 2) design principles for game-based exhibits that facilitate development of computational literacy; and 3) new knowledge of variations in design and gameplay across diverse gameplay users, including those from underrepresented groups in computer science. It is anticipated that 1,000 museum youth visitors will directly participate in the study.
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.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Matthew BerlandLeilah LyonsMatthew Cannady
In this project, education researchers, environmental scientists, and educators will develop a computer tool to let STEM educators and curriculum developers build local environmental science models. The system will use data about land use to automatically construct map-based simulations of any area in the United States. Users will be able to choose from a range of environmental and economic issues to include in these models. The system will create simulations that ask students to change to patterns of land use -- for example, increasing land zoned for housing, or open land, or industrial development -- to try to meet environmental and social goals. As a result, students will be able to learn about the interaction of environmental and economic issues relevant to their own city, town, neighborhood, or region. These map-based simulations will be incorporated into an existing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education tool, Land Science, in which learners work in a fictional planning office to study how zoning affects economic and environmental issues in a community. Research has shown that Land Science is mode effective when learners are exploring issues in an area near their home, and the current study will investigate how and why local simulations improve environmental science learning. This project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program which supports work to enhance learning in informal environments by funding innovative research, approaches, and resources for use in a variety of settings.
In this project, the research team will build, test, and deploy a toolkit that will allow informal STEM educators and developers of informal STEM programming to easily adapt an existing environmental science learning environment, which consists of a place-based virtual internship in urban planning and ecology, to their local contexts, learning objectives, and learner populations. Land Science is a virtual internship in which young people explore the environmental and socio-economic impacts of land-use decisions. To do so, they play the role of interns at an urban planning firm developing a new land-use proposal for the city of Lowell, Massachusetts: they read reports, virtually visit sites, determine stakeholder priorities, and use a geographic information system (GIS) model to evaluate the socio-economic and environmental impacts of land-use choices. No one plan can satisfy all stakeholders, so learners must compromise to create an effective plan and justify their decisions. Land Science has been shown to improve civic engagement, interest in eco-social issues, and understanding of scientific models, but it is most effective when the location of the virtual internship is in or near the learners' home town. To improve the accessibility and impact of this effective learning intervention, the interdisciplinary research team, which includes learning scientists, land-use experts, and informal STEM educators, will develop a Local Environmental Modeling toolkit, which will allow educators to change the location of the simulation and the stakeholder groups, zoning codes, and environmental and socio-economic indicators included in the land-use model. The system will ensure that the model produced is functional, realistic, and appropriately complex. The localized versions of Land Science produced by informal STEM educators will be used in a range of contexts and locations, allowing the research team to study the effects of an online, place-based learning intervention on environmental science learning, STEM interest and motivation, and civic engagement.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
David ShafferKristen ScopinichHolly GibbsJeffrey Linderoth
As part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments. This Change Makers project will establish Food Justice Ambassador corps across three cities in Massachusetts where youth will install, manage and learn the science and technology underlying hydroponics. The project takes a near-peer mentoring approach that empowers high school youth to take the lead in improving ethnic minority and low-income residents' access to healthy produce and to help educate middle school youth regarding the value of fresh produce in one's diet by learning the science of hydroponics. Youth will create story maps to visualize food accessibility in their communities. High school youth will work with their communities to establish hydroponic farms in middle school after-school settings. The food that is grown will be provided to the community through farmers' markets. Youth will share their work with a larger community of urban farmers at the Massachusetts Urban Farming Conference. This project seeks to understand the contribution on youth development by the model's three components: (1) STEM learning embedded in a social justice framework, (2) near-peer mentoring, and (3) youth purpose and career development. This will enable researchers to better understand how the project enables youth to learn STEM skills; apply them to a real life problem; learn the relevance of STEM skills for addressing personal, career aspiration, and social justice issues; develop a sense of purpose and aspirations related to STEM fields; and mentor other youth through the same process. The project will use a mixed-method, multi-site longitudinal study utilizing quantitative surveys, structural equation modeling, and qualitative interviews to study the intersections of the components of the project. As such, the study will address three key questions: 1) How do youth and mentors perceive and experience their roles as participants in the pedagogy? 2) What is the impact of the intervention on youth' sense of purpose, identity, career adaptability, work volition, critical consciousness, school engagement, STEM interests, and STEM intentionality? 3) What is the contribution of relational/mentoring and psychosocial/career adaptability aspects of the youths' contexts on their capacity to benefit from this program and to develop and sustain purpose and engagement in school and STEM? Most urban youth (and adults) have little knowledge of where their food comes from and have limited opportunities to learn how to grow produce as well as develop related skills that can lead to a career in a STEM field. This is particularly disconcerting as 55% of African Americans live inside central cities (90% in metropolitan areas) and over half of all Latino/as live in central cities (United States Census Bureau, 2011). This project entails the recruitment of low-income youth from populations underrepresented in science into a program where social justice concerns (food justice, food security) are illuminated, analyzed, and acted upon through the development of STEM knowledge and skills. Specifically, this project recognizes the potential for urban youth to become deeply knowledgeable citizens who can mobilize their STEM knowledge and skills to resolve social injustices such as food deserts. If successful, this project will provide a model that should be transferable to similar contexts to help broaden participation in STEM.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
George BarnettBelle LiangDavid Blustein
As a part of its overall strategy to enhance learning in informal environments, the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program funds research and innovative resources for use in a variety of settings. This Broad Implementation project would scale up the CryptoClub Project, an afterschool and online program designed to engage middle school youth in mathematics and cryptography. The project builds on previous successful work and evaluation that is ready for scale up using a train-the-trainer model implemented through a partnership with the National Girls Collaborative. The project will train 160 new CryptoClub leaders who will then train 800 new leaders at 20 hub sites reaching 9600 students. In addition, professional development modules and webinars will continue to refresh leader skills. Other project components include an online multiplayer cryptography game, weekly challenges through social media, and digital cryptology badges for students.
The research uses a think-aloud method with students as they actually attempt to solve the cryptology problems using mathematical thinking. Three think-aloud studies will be performed during the Project. The research team will code transcripts of the interviews for evidence of the mathematical thinking intended to be addressed by each activity, as well as capturing unexpected kinds of thinking. Tasks will also be rated according to the type of knowledge elicited. A written report will include statistical analyses of the think-aloud and interview responses, interpreted in light of the overall CryptoClub goals. The findings will contribute to both future research efforts and practice. The evaluation by EDC uses a quasi-experimental design, which assesses project outcomes for trainers, leaders, students, and Internet users. EDC will also investigate the fidelity to the CryptoClub model as it is scaled up. These studies have strong potential for informing numerous other projects that are at a stage where scale up is under consideration.