ECR Projects

Explore past and current fundamental STEM education research projects across the three research areas that NSF's EDU Core Research (ECR) program funds, as well as across ECR funding types. Other search filters draw from both NSF's data and the ECR Hub's hand coding of award abstracts.

Ninth-grade biology students create cell models using clay.

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STEM Workforce Development STEM Workforce Development  Broadening Participation in STEM Broadening Participation in STEM

Capacity building: Understanding American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian student outcomes in the STEM education research literature

Effective Years: 2016-2020

This project will result in a literature review of studies of American Indian, Alaskan Native, and Native Hawaiian and STEM education and learning as well as studies that include Indigenous populations as part of a larger underrepresented racial and ethnic minority group. The ultimate educational significance of this project is to identify practical strategies to address the extreme dearth of Native Americans in STEM education and careers. The outcomes of this project will set the stage for future programming to foster the participation of American Indian, Alaskan Native, and Native Hawaiian in STEM education and careers.

One of the goals of this project is to understand how the STEM experiences and retention of American Indian, Alaskan Native, and Native Hawaiian populations can be best understood within the broader underrepresented minority discussion. To do this, the investigators will conduct a secondary literature review aiming to identify common themes. This literature review will lead to a workshop of experts in STEM education and Indigenous populations. The workshop participants will discuss the current state of research, identifying themes and gaps in the research in order to develop an action plan to guide future research as well as provide best practices for American Indian, Alaskan Native, and Native Hawaiian educational organizations like the American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES).