Effective: 2023-2025

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Youmi Suk

Institution: Teachers College, Columbia University

The current math course-taking plan for high school students across much of the United States is not optimized for every student’s success in math, especially in advanced mathematics. In particular, there has been disproportional participation in advanced math courses among different racial/ethnic and income groups. To this end, this research project develops data-driven, personalized math course-taking plans by leveraging recent advances in personalized medicine. In personalized medicine,...

Effective: 2022-2027

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Zeyu Xu

Institution: American Institutes for Research in the Behavioral Sciences

America’s community colleges play a vital role in strengthening the country’s science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce. More than one-quarter of all STEM jobs are held by workers with either an associate’s degree or some other sub-baccalaureate training. Community colleges also play a central role in increasing the diversity of the STEM workforce, as they often serve students from populations underrepresented in their participation in STEM fields of study....

Effective: 2022-2027

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Lin Bian

Institution: University of Chicago

The increased demand for intellectual talent has highlighted the need for more female scientists, yet women are consistently underrepresented in the STEM domain. A pervading stereotype associating intellectual talent with men rather than women is a powerful cultural message that is in part responsible for this gender gap, termed the gender brilliance stereotype. This pernicious stereotype emerges early and immediately shapes children’s interests. To tackle this gender disparity from its...

Effective: 2022-2027

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Abiola Akanmu, Andrea N Ofori-Boadu

Institutions: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University

While universities equip students with theoretical knowledge for STEM, there can be challenges in employing those theories to solve real-life problems. This challenge has resulted in an imbalance between the preparation of graduates entering the workforce and the demands of the industry. This disconnection is persistent in the construction industry as construction practitioners continue to highlight skill shortages that have resulted in low performance and low productivity. This research...

Effective: 2022-2027

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Shanta R Robinson

Institution: University of Chicago

Existing educational inequities produce complex challenges for Black students, particularly in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) classrooms. Black students who show promise for success in STEM while experiencing homelessness find themselves particularly marginalized at the intersection of race and class. The purpose of this project is to center the voices and experiences of Black, high achieving homeless adolescents to better understand the resources and strengths they...

Effective: 2022-2027

Funding Type: Other

Principal Investigator: David I Miller

Institution: American Institutes for Research in the Behavioral Sciences

As a 5-year resource center, the EHR Core Research – Resource Coordination Hub (ECR Hub) is designed to advance the ways in which NSF’s ECR Core (ECR) and ECR Building Capacity in STEM Education Research (ECR:BCSER) programs can better use and support fundamental research on STEM learning and learning environments, broadening participation in STEM, and STEM workforce development. ECR-funded research has the potential to address pressing national problems by developing foundational knowledge...

Effective: 2022-2027

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Yu Chen

Institution: Louisiana State University

The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) program is a National Science Foundation-wide activity that offers awards in support of early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education, to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization, and to build a foundation for a lifetime of leadership in integrating education and research. This CAREER project will examine psychological and social factors that are influential to...

Effective: 2022-2027

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Homero Murzi

Institution: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2). The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) program is a National Science Foundation-wide activity that supports early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education, to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization, and to build a foundation for a lifetime of leadership in integrating education and research. This CAREER...

Effective: 2022-2026

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Ross J Benbow

Institution: University of Wisconsin-Madison

The project expands a prior study by examining the links between social support networks and persistence along STEM career pathways among “student service members/veterans,” defined as undergraduate students who are retired/discharged military veterans. Building on current surveys in the State of Wisconsin, the study extends the data collection along three dimensions. First is longitudinally along the population’s academic trajectories encompassing several data collection points over five...

Effective: 2022-2026

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Heather L Thiry

Institution: University of Colorado at Boulder

This project focuses on a critical juncture in the STEM education and workforce pipeline, the transition of community college students into baccalaureate degree programs and potentially to graduate school. This transition period is especially important for students from groups that are underrepresented in their overall participation in STEM fields of study. The goal of the investigators is to understand how STEM transfer students use assets, such as disciplinary co-curricular opportunities...

Effective: 2022-2026

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Julie Aldridge, Nicole Else-Quest, Joseph Roy, So Yoon Yoon

Institutions: Ohio State University, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, American Society For Engineering Education, University of Cincinnati Main Campus

The ongoing lack of diversity in the engineering doctoral workforce remains a significant problem with far-reaching implications for the US economy. The long-term vitality of the US workforce relies on the full range of engineering career pathways being available to all Americans. A diverse STEM workforce is more creative and innovative. While the number of women completing STEM doctorates has risen, the proportion of women earning engineering doctorates remains low. And, in 2019, while 24.1%...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Aramati A Casper, Sarah L Eddy, Amanda K Lane

Institutions: Colorado State University, Florida International University, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities

This project examines how a more accurate curriculum about the diversity of sexes found across species, the role of the environment in sex determination, and the complex relationship between sex and gender can create a more inclusive environment for transgender, non-binary, and gender non-conforming (TNG) students in undergraduate biology courses. Research indicates that rather than emphasizing the diversity of strategies and experiences that organisms have around sex, gender, and orientation,...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Wendy M Smith

Institution: University of Nebraska-Lincoln

2201486 AbstractThe disparity in achievement and access for students from backgrounds that are underrepresented in STEM are well documented, but there remains a lack of attention to what to do with this knowledge and how to measure the impact of improvement efforts beyond pass rates and demographics. While many university mathematics departments value providing diverse, equitable, and inclusive (DEI) student experiences, the faculty often do not have the professional training to engage with DEI...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Lizandra C Godwin

Institution: University of New Mexico

Advancing participation in engineering is significant for meeting NSF’s goals and benefits national priorities. The University of New Mexico aims to improve understanding of the impacts of Latinas’ undergraduate experiences on their graduate school and career aspirations in engineering. As a designated Hispanic-serving Institution, the University of New Mexico is an ideal site for this study. Through advancing knowledge of the impact of intersectional identities on interest in graduate...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Catherine Mobley

Institution: Clemson University

The project examines STEM social and behavioral scientists’ identity formation to produce results that can be used in designing programs to attract a larger and more diverse pool of students to these disciplines. The study investigates factors that influence the development of STEM social scientists who will engage in transdisciplinary scholarship, whether some programs do so more extensively and more effectively than others, and in what ways and why. It provides a qualitative focus on...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: David S Yeager

Institution: University of Texas at Austin

Recently, psychological research on broadening participation in STEM has shifted from student-focused interventions (e.g., belonging or growth mindset interventions given to students) to context-focused interventions (aimed at instructors to create cultures of belonging or growth). Tools for evaluating the changes in instructors’ practices induced by these programs have been lacking, however. Popular self-report methods for instructors can be biased due to faulty recall or social desirability...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Virginia J Flood

Institution: SUNY at Buffalo

Active, collaborative learning approaches are widely seen as effective ways for students to learn undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). However, learning outcomes are highly contingent on the quality of the interactional processes in which students engage. There is a great deal of research on successful verbal communicational practices in group work, but little is known about how nonverbal communicational practices like gesture contribute to successful...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Wendy M DuBow

Institution: University of Colorado at Boulder

This study addresses the longstanding problem of the lack of diversity among persons studying and working in the field of computer science (CS). The statistics describing the gender and race/ethnicity of those who earn CS degrees tell a story of a discipline that has been slow to change. The percentage of CS undergraduate degrees that have been earned by women has barely risen in nearly two decades. The lack of representation of Hispanic, African American, and Native American students in...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Dina Verdin

Institution: Arizona State University

The project aims to build the investigator’s capacity to conduct robust fundamental STEM education research by implementing a small-scale research project and a professional development plan. The research investigates how culturally responsive gamified activities impact STEM identity development and promote STEM pathways among students of migratory families. The project extends the efforts of the Migratory Student Summer Academy at Arizona State University that provides summer enrichment...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Allyson Flaster

Institution: Regents of the University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

Advanced training and education in STEM are of critical importance for the nation’s workforce and economic status. Equitable access to graduate level training reduces barriers for individuals from minoritized groups. Standardized graduate exams are becoming less important in the graduate admissions process, which places a higher weight on letters of recommendation for the selection of graduate students for a program. This project focuses on examining the language used by mentors in describing...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Nicole C Kelp

Institution: Colorado State University

Broadening participation in STEM is critical on many levels, from the equity perspective of removing barriers for success for people from historically excluded groups and from the perspective of increasing knowledge in the field of STEM. Both people and scientific endeavors benefit from increasing inclusion. However, evidence indicates that students who experience marginalization due to their socioeconomic status, first generation college attendance, or race and ethnicity are underrepresented...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Julianne Wenner

Institution: Clemson University

Families are children’s first teachers and significantly influence children’s interest, engagement, and aspirations (IEA) in science. Family attitudes, conversations about science, expectations for their children, and family science/STEM career role models can be influential, particularly for people who identify with populations that are underrepresented in science. However, what families from these populations provide in terms of support for IEA in science is often framed as inadequate or...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Ryan Baker, Nicole Else-Quest, Bruce M McLaren, Timothy J Nokes-Malach, Jon R Star

Institutions: University of Pennsylvania, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Carnegie-Mellon University, University of Pittsburgh, Harvard University

Despite evidence that gender differences in math achievement have narrowed or disappeared in recent decades, stereotypes about men being better than women at math emerge early in childhood and persist through adulthood. These perceptions appear to influence female students’ interest and performance in math, as well as their pursuit of STEM careers. Given the potential motivational benefits of digital learning games, games might provide a pathway for reducing math anxiety for female students...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Julie J Park

Institution: University of Maryland, College Park

This project will explore how Black undergraduate and graduate students in STEM view the relationship between religion and science, and the implications for their persistence in STEM. The project is of significance because religion and religious communities were recently identified as a vital source of support for many of Black students, although for STEM students the dichotomy between science and religion can be challenging. While numerous studies document perceived tensions between religion...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Tamara Pearson, Rebecca Zarch

Institutions: Spelman College, SageFox Consulting Group, LLC

This research project seeks to examine longstanding inequities in access to and participation in computer science (CS) education. Decades of research have shown that certain subgroups (e.g., women, students with disabilities, underrepresented minority students) tend to face substantial barriers to participating in CS courses and programs. As computing education continues to expand in K-12 education systems, it is important to understand how early experiences in computing education relate to...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Sara Hooshangi

Institution: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Participation in computer science by women is a significant goal for NSF and benefits the nation’s workforce in emerging technologies. Academic and career path decisions are made by individuals and understanding barriers that contribute to student selection of computer science careers may reduce the gender gap in this field. Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University seeks to understand personal, social, and institutional constraints that influence the decision-making of first-year...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Fashina Alade

Institution: Michigan State University

Advancing participation in STEM is significant for meeting NSF’s goals and benefits the nation. Michigan State University aims to improve understanding of the impacts of STEM-focused children’s media programming by identifying children’s understanding of racial diversity cures in educational television shows. The professional development plan will build research capacity by exploring children's attention to and interpretations of diversity cues and then building a multi-method study that...

Effective: 2022-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Roger E Beaty, Mark Fuge, Dan R Johnson

Institutions: Pennsylvania State Univ University Park, University of Maryland, College Park, Washington and Lee University

This collaborative project from research teams at Pennsylvania State University, University of Maryland, and Washington and Lee University focuses on measuring creativity in undergraduate engineering education. The ability to think creatively is essential for success in STEM fields, particularly engineering, which requires designing solutions to complex problems that often have no single or "correct" solution. The Next Generation Science Standards identify creative thinking skills, such as...

Effective: 2022-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Kristen N Bieda, Megan E Staples

Institutions: Michigan State University, University of Connecticut

Creating and justifying mathematical claims is an essential learning goal and valued outcome of a mathematics education. To advance equitable learning outcomes, it is essential that teachers pursue this goal in ways that ensure every student has opportunities to develop and share justifications in their classrooms. The intended outcomes of this pilot study are: (1) practice-grounded, foundational knowledge about how students’ participation in mathematical justification can advance equity...

Effective: 2022-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: James R Neumeister

Institution: National Opinion Research Center

This research project focuses on understanding the experiences and perspectives of marginalized groups in STEM fields. Three aims frame the project team's research plan. First is to examine factors that influence and predict career trajectories of subgroups of STEM doctoral students and graduates based on their career motivations and aspirations. Second is to develop and integrate culturally responsive student and context-level measures to investigate the career pathways of STEM PhD students....

Effective: 2022-2024

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Tim McEldowney

Institution: West Virginia University Research Corporation

This project aims to illuminate how undergraduate student knowledge about the graduate school application and admissions processes acts as a barrier to earning advanced degrees in mathematics for students historically underrepresented in STEM disciplines. The project will consist of a combination of exploratory research and professional development activities to advance the PI’s expertise in quantitative and qualitative research methods. The project will survey undergraduate mathematics...

Effective: 2022-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Adrianna Kezar

Institution: University of Southern California

This project addresses the fundamentally important question of who the faculty in the United States are, and how they advance knowledge and prepare the future workforce in STEM. Faculty are central to the success of higher education, and through teaching, research, and service, faculty contribute to the education of the future workforce in STEM, the advancement of knowledge, and the success of the higher education enterprise. Since 2004, when data was last collected for the National Study of...

Effective: 2022-2023

Funding Type: Conference

Principal Investigator: Erin Lynch

Institution: Winston-Salem State University

Pipelines to Pathways: Humanizing Diversity in STEM, is proposed to improve mentorship and training in emerging research designed to improve STEM student outcomes, particularly for those students coming from underserved and underrepresented populations in STEM. This two-day workshop is designed to attract STEM faculty, both K-12 and post-secondary, and research scholars in STEM teaching and student learning to present and learn about evidence-based practices and methodology design to implement...

Effective: 2022-2022

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Lori Andersen

Institution: University of Hawaii

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2), and by the EHR Core Research program. The project will investigate the use of science curriculum features to develop culturally diverse fifth-grade students’ abilities to use scientific thinking tools. Thinking tools will include crosscutting concepts such as systems and system models, patterns, and cause and effect, as well as cultural concepts, such as reciprocity, human-nature relations,...

Effective: 2021-2026

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Kerrie G Wilkins-Yel

Institution: University of Massachusetts Boston

The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is a National Science Foundation-wide activity that offers awards in support of early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education, and to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization. This project aims to serve the national interest by addressing the inequitable representation of graduate Women of Color (WoC) (i.e., Black/African American, Latina, Indigenous, and Asian...

Effective: 2021-2026

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Ginger Shultz

Institution: Regents of the University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

This project aims to increase the support students from non-dominant groups receive in schools by understanding better how teacher training and curricular resources can make curricula relevant and compelling to those students. Culturally relevant education makes visible the value of students’ diverse perspectives and experiences and may better support underserved students in STEM. While culturally relevant educational approaches are powerful, they rely on the teachers' competence in the...

Effective: 2021-2026

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Shetay Ashford-Hanserd

Institution: Texas State University - San Marcos

The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) program is a National Science Foundation-wide activity that offers awards in support of early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education, to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization, and to build a foundation for a lifetime of leadership in integrating education and research. This project will examine the effects of community cultural wealth on the persistence of Black and...

Effective: 2021-2026

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Bryce Hughes

Institution: Montana State University

The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) program is a National Science Foundation-wide activity that offers awards in support of junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education, and the integration of education and research within the context of the mission of their organizations. This project awarded to a CAREER scholar has the goal to examine the participation of LGBTQ students in undergraduate STEM programs to understand how...

Effective: 2021-2026

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Valerie J Taylor

Institution: Lehigh University

The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) program is a National Science Foundation-wide activity that offers awards in support of junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education, and the integration of education and research within the context of the mission of their organizations. This CAREER award supports experimental and longitudinal studies that aim to increase diversity and inclusion in higher education STEM culture. The...

Effective: 2021-2026

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Kirstin C Busch

Institution: North Carolina State University

Developing solutions to large-scale collective problems -- such as resilience to environmental challenges -- requires scientifically literate communities. However, the predominant conception of scientific literacy has focused on individuals, and there is not consensus as to what community level scientific literacy is or how to measure it. Thus, a 2016 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report, “Science Literacy: Concepts, Contexts, and Consequences,” stated that...

Effective: 2021-2026

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Preeti Gupta

Institution: American Museum Natural History

The American Museum of Natural History plans to investigate the relationship between mentored research and youths’ STEM trajectory from high school to early college. The study builds on a previously funded project that examined the experiences of 733 high school youth who participated in an out-of-school, in-depth science research and mentoring program through the New York City Science Research Mentoring Consortium. The current study will examine how 380 of the initial participants navigate...

Effective: 2021-2026

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: David W Shaffer

Institution: University of Wisconsin-Madison

This project will advance research in an important area needed for contributing to the national need for well-educated scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians through the creation and validation of a process designed to effectively and fairly code educational data. Over its five-year duration, this project will develop and test an approach to coding data on learning in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). It will do so in a manner that takes into account...

Effective: 2021-2025

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Sandra L Laursen

Institution: University of Colorado at Boulder

ADVANCE and Beyond: Understanding Processes of Institutional Change to Promote STEM Equity and EducationThis research has significance in seeking to provide evidence-based support to scholars and practitioners who are working to promote systemic institutional change in STEM higher education. To solve stubborn problems that lead to inequitable outcomes, such as biased faculty tenure and promotion processes, uneven leadership opportunities, and hostile departmental climates, requires more than a...

Effective: 2021-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Logan Fiorella

Institution: University of Georgia Research Foundation Inc

With support from NSF’s EHR Core Research (ECR) program, this project seeks to serve the national interest by identifying effective instructional methods to support student understanding of core science concepts. This project will study learning in the biological sciences among introductory and advanced undergraduates. Science educators and policy makers aim to facilitate students’ development of deep conceptual understanding and the ability to solve novel problems in the classroom and the...

Effective: 2021-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Jonathan T Eckhardt, Brent D Goldfarb

Institutions: University of Wisconsin-Madison, University of Maryland, College Park

This is a collaborative project, with the University of Wisconsin-Madison as the lead institution and the University of Maryland as the partnering institution, to explore the entrepreneurial proclivity of undergraduate women majoring in STEM fields. The researchers propose a multi-method approach led by an interdisciplinary team to (1) identify factors that influence entrepreneurial proclivity and (2) develop and test interventions related to closing gender disparities in STEM entrepreneurship....

Effective: 2021-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Jonathan E Cook, Ciara Smalls Glover

Institutions: Pennsylvania State Univ University Park, Georgia State University Research Foundation, Inc.

Understanding the impact of adversity experiences on STEM persistence and performance is significant to broaden participation of individuals from groups that have been traditionally underrepresented. Researchers at Georgia State University and Pennsylvania State University aim to study the effects of adversity experiences on student motivation to pursue STEM majors and student persistence and performance in STEM degree programs. The project aims to develop and use a model that predicts how...

Effective: 2021-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Dustin B Thoman

Institution: San Diego State University Foundation

It is critically important that the United States create and maintain a thriving scientific workforce that propels future discoveries and innovations. The academic research laboratory is an essential context where students learn what science is, what is expected of a scientist, and decide whether they will pursue or persist within the scientific community. This project investigates the transmission of norms, expectations, and values between and among scientists, their students, and their...

Effective: 2021-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Amy J Ko, Mo Zhang

Institutions: University of Washington, Educational Testing Service

This project aims to promote equitable design of Computer Science (CS) assessment in secondary and post-secondary education in the United States and globally, increasing the diversity of students engaging in CS learning through reduced test bias. In this study, we aim to address difficulties in assessing computer programming by investigating critical characteristics of programming tasks using both response process and product data. Findings will have direct practical implications for developing...

Effective: 2021-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Sara E Grineski, Danielle X Morales

Institutions: University of Utah, University of Texas at El Paso, Worcester State University

Understanding mentoring relationships is critical to increasing diversity in STEM fields. Researchers at the University of Texas at El Paso and the University of Utah propose to study the effects of mentor relationship mismatch on student outcomes during NSF Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) programs. This project aims to employ a novel approach to studying mentoring by examining multilevel mentoring and demographics of students and the mentor team. The project aims to collect data...

Effective: 2021-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Heidi Schweingruber

Institution: National Academy of Sciences

Inequity in education is a critical issue in the United States with well-documented evidence that many students receive substantially lower quality educations due to structural inequity in public schooling. These inequities are particularly pronounced in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education where issues of access to high quality instruction and advanced coursework are intertwined with stereotypes and biases about which students can succeed in STEM. Using the...