RISES (Re-energize and Invigorate Student Engagement through Science) is a coordinated suite of resources including 42 interactive English and Spanish STEM videos produced by Children's Museum Houston in coordination with the science curriculum department at Houston ISD. The videos are aligned to the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills standards, and each come with a bilingual Activity Guide and Parent Prompt sheet, which includes guiding questions and other extension activities.
This poster was presented at the 2021 NSF AISL Awardee Meeting.
To engage youth in global challenges such as energy issues, students’ own community can serve as personally relevant venues for scientific inquiry. For example, after students learn about heat transfer in school, they can use this knowledge to inspect the energy efficiency of their own schools and public buildings in their neighborhood.
To bridge the gap between school science and citizen science, students need scientific instruments that can be used both in and out of school and a community to share their discoveries.
This short (approximately 2-3 hours), self-paced non-credit learning module is designed for those new to conducting research in communities impacted by energy development. You will learn about the concept of “research fatigue” and become more prepared for fieldwork by learning what to expect when you visit energy-impacted communities.
Access is free for students, researchers and those living in or serving communities impacted by energy development.
Participants who complete the online course can a digital badge called Understanding Research Fatigue. Earners of this certification will
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Suzi TaylorJulia Hobson HaggertyKristin SmithRuchie Pathak
This workbook / planning guide was designed as an outreach tool to support students and early-career researchers who are studying the social impacts of energy development and wish to better understand and mitigate “research fatigue,” a state in which citizens of a community who are already experiencing massive change may be exhausted by additional attention from researchers, the media and others outside the community.
The workbook can be used as a stand-alone resource or as a complement to the Understanding Research Fatigue online module (https://eu.courses.montana.edu/CourseStatus.awp
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Suzi TaylorJulia Hobson HaggertyJeffrey JacquetGene TheodoriKathryn Bills Walsh
In this article, we follow up on food scientists' findings that people judge new food technologies and related products (un)favourably immediately after just hearing the name of the technology. From the reactions, it appears that people use their attitudes to technologies they know to evaluate new technologies. Using categorization theory, in this study we have found that, by triggering associations with a familiar technology, a name of the new technology can be enough to determine emerging attitudes. Comparison between the technology used for categorization and another familiar technology had
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Reginald BoersmaP. Marijn PoortvlietBart Gremmen
We characterize the factors that determine who becomes an inventor in the United States, focusing on the role of inventive ability (“nature”) vs. environment (“nurture”). Using deidentified data on 1.2 million inventors from patent records linked to tax records, we first show that children’s chances of becoming inventors vary sharply with characteristics at birth, such as their race, gender, and parents’ socioeconomic class. For example, children from high-income (top 1%) families are ten times as likely to become inventors as those from below-median income families. These gaps persist even
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Alex BellRaj ChettyXavier JaravelNeviana PetkovaJohn Van Reenen
The goal of the National Science Foundation?s Research Coordination Network (RCN) program is to advance a field or create new directions in research or education by supporting groups of investigators to communicate and coordinate their research, training and educational activities across disciplinary, organizational, geographic and international boundaries. This RCN will bring together scholars and practitioners working at the intersection of equity and interdisciplinary making in STEM education. Making is a culture that emphasizes interest-driven learning by doing within an informal, peer-led and creative social environment. Hundreds of maker spaces and maker-oriented classroom pedagogies have developed across the country. Maker spaces often include digital technologies such as computer design, 3-D printers, and laser cutters, but may also include traditional crafts or a variety of artist-driven creations. The driving purpose of the project is to collectively broaden STEM-focused maker participation in the United States through pursuing common research questions, sharing resources, and incubating emergent inquiry and knowledge across multiple working sites of practice. The network aims to build capacity for research and knowledge, building in consequential and far-reaching mechanisms to leverage combined efforts of a core group of scholars, practitioners, and an extended network of formal and informal education partners in urban and rural sites serving people from groups underrepresented in STEM. Maker learning spaces can be particularly fruitful spaces for STEM learning toward equity because they foster interest-driven, collective, and community-oriented learning in making for social and community change. The network will be led by a team of multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary researchers from different geographic regions of the United States and guided by a steering committee of prominent researchers and practitioners in making and equity will convene to facilitate network activities.
Equitable processes are rooted in a commitment to understand and build on the skills, practices, values, and knowledge of communities marginalized in STEM. The research network aims to fill in gaps in current understandings about making and equity, including the many ways different projects define equity and STEM in making. The project will survey the existing research terrain to develop a dynamic and cohesive understanding of making that connects to learners' STEM ideas, communities, and historical ways of making. Additionally, the network will collaboratively develop central research questions for network partners. The network will create a repository for ethical and promising practices in community-based research and aggregate data across sites, among other activities. The network will support collaboration across a multiplicity of making spaces, research institutions, and community organizations throughout the country to share data, methodologies, ways of connecting to local communities and approaches to robust integration of STEM skills and practices. Project impacts will include new research partnerships, a dissemination hub for research related to making and equity, professional development for researchers and practitioners, and leveraging collective research findings about making values and practices to improve approaches to STEM-rich making integration in informal learning environments. The project is funded by NSF's Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program, which supports innovative research, approaches, and resources for use in a variety of settings. 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.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
Public trust in agricultural biotechnology organizations that produce so-called ‘genetically-modified organisms’ (GMOs) is affected by misinformed attacks on GM technology and worry that producers' concern for profits overrides concern for the public good. In an experiment, we found that reporting that the industry engages in open and transparent research practices increased the perceived trustworthiness of university and corporate organizations involved with GMOs. Universities were considered more trustworthy than corporations overall, supporting prior findings in other technology domains
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Asheley LandrumJoseph HilgardRobert LullHeather AkinKathleen Hall Jamieson
In partnership with the Digital NEST, students engage in near to peer learning with a technical tool for the benefit of a nonprofit that tackles issues the youth are passionate about. Youth build first from an 'internal’ Impactathon, to planning and developing an additional Impactathon for a local partner and then traveling to another partner elsewhere in the state. Participants range from 14 to 24 from UC Santa Cruz students to middle schoolers from Watsonville and Salinas.
This poster was presented at the 2019 AISL Principal Investigators Meeting.
This pilot study will examine the effectiveness of an innovative applied social change, community and technology based program on marginalized youths' access, interest, efficacy and motivation to learn and engage in digital technology applications. Using stratified near-peer and peer-to-peer mentoring approaches, the pilot builds on extant literature that indicates that peer-supported hands-on mentoring and experiences can alleviate some barriers to youth engagement in digital technologies, particularly among underrepresented groups. In this project, undergraduate students will mentor and work collaboratively with high school youth primarily of Hispanic descent and community-based organizations to develop creative technology-based solutions to address social issues and challenges within their local communities, culminating in events called Impactathons. These community-hosted local and state-wide events set this pilot project apart from similar work in the field. The Impactathons not only provide a space for intellectual discourse and problem-solving among the undergraduate-youth-community partners but the Impactathons will also codify expertise from scientists, social scientists, technologists, community leaders, and other stakeholders to develop technology-based solutions with real world application. If successful, a distal outcome will be increased youth interest in digital technologies and related fields. In the short term, favorable findings will provide preliminary evidence of success and lay the foundation for a more extensive study in the future.
This pilot project is a collaboration between the Everett Program, a student-led program for Technology and Social Change at the University of California Santa Cruz - a Hispanic Serving Institution - and the Digital NEST, a non-profit, high-tech youth career development and collaboration space for young people ages 14-24. Through this partnership and other recruitment efforts, an estimated 70-90 individuals will participate in the Impactathon pilot program over two years. Nearly two-thirds of the participants are expected to be undergraduate students. They will receive extensive training in near-peer and peer-to-peer mentoring and serve as mentors for and co-innovation developers with the high school youth participants. The undergraduates and youth will partner with local community organizations to identify a local social challenge that can be addressed through a technology-based solution. The emergent challenges will vary and could span the spectrum of STEM and applied social science topics of interest. Working in informal contexts (i.e., afterschool. weekend), the undergraduate-youth-community partner teams will work collaboratively to develop practical technology-based solutions to real world challenges. The teams will convene three times per year, locally and statewide, at student and community led Impactathons to share their work and glean insights from other teams to refine their innovations. In parallel, the research team will examine the effectiveness of the Impactathon model in increasing the undergraduate and youths' interest, motivation, excitement, engagement and learning of digital technologies. In addition to the research, the formative and summative evaluations should provide valuable insights on the effectiveness of the model and its potential for expansion and replication.
The project is co-funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) Program and STEM +C. The AISL program seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments. STEM + C focuses on research and development of interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches to the integration of computing within STEM teaching and learning for preK-12 students in both formal and informal settings.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
This NSF INCLUDES Design and Development Launch Pilot, "Expanding Diversity in Energy and Environmental Sustainability (EDEES)", will develop a network of institutions in the United States mid-Atlantic region to recruit, train, and prepare a significant number of underrepresented, underserved, and underprivileged members of the American society in the areas of alternative energy generation and environmental sustainability. Researchers from Delaware State University (DSU) will lead the effort in collaboration with scientists and educators from the University of Delaware, Delaware Technical Community College, University of Maryland, and Stony Brook University. The program comprises a strong educational component in different aspects of green energy generation and environmental sciences including the development of a baccalaureate degree in Green Energy Engineering and the further growth of the recently established Renewable Energy Education Center at our University. The program comprises an active involvement of students from local K-12 institutions, including Delaware State University Early College High School. The character of the University as a Historically Black College (HBCU) and the relatively high minority population of the region will facilitate the completion of the goal to serve minority students. The program will also involve the local community and the private sector by promoting the idea of a green City of Dover, Delaware, in the years to come.
The goal of EDEES-INCLUDES pilot comprises the enrollment of at least twenty underrepresented minority students in majors related to green energy and environmental sustainability. It also entails the establishment of a baccalaureate degree in Green Energy Engineering at DSU. The program is expected to strengthen the pathway from two-year energy-related associate degree programs to four-year degrees by ensuring at least five students/year transfer to DSU in energy-related programs. The pilot is also expected to increase the number of high school graduates from underrepresented groups who choose to attend college in STEM majors. Based on previous experience and existing collaborations, the partner institutions expect to grow as an integrated research-educational network where students will be able to obtain expertise in the competitive field of green energy. The pilot program comprises a deep integration of education and research currently undergoing in the involved institutions. In collaboration with its partner institutions, DSU plans to consistently and systematically involve students from the K-12 system to nurture the future recruitment efforts of the network. A career in Green Energy Engineering is using and expanding up existing infrastructure and collaborations. The program will involve the local community through events, workshops and open discussions on energy related fields using social networks and other internet technology in order to promote energy literacy.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Aristides MarcanoMohammed KhanGulnihal OzbayGabriel Gwanmesia
In today's society a variety of challenges need attention because they are considered to affect our well-being. Many of these challenges can be addressed with new innovations, yet they may also introduce new challenges. Communication of these new innovations is vital. This importance is also addressed by the concept of Responsible Research and Innovation. In the present commentary we draw on a dataset of 196 research projects and discuss the two research streams of Science Communication and Responsible Research and Innovation and how they are complements to each other. We conclude with
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Victor ScholtenJeroen van den HovenEefje CuppenSteven Flipse