Effective: 2019-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Lara C Perez-Felkner

Institution: Florida State University

This EHR Core Research project will conduct research on women's participation in computing fields, with a focus on community college starters using a comprehensive dataset from Florida's educational institutions and national-level comparable data. Despite the growing demand for computer scientists and engineers, women's representation in this industry remains problematically low while their share of degree earners has declined nationally. In 2014, the most recent year for which U.S. national...

Effective: 2019-2024

Funding Type: BCSER Institute

Principal Investigator: Larry V Hedges

Institution: Northwestern University

The primary goal of this set of workshops is to provide STEM education researchers with the framework, skills, and community they need to implement new developments in causal inference methods into their research. These methods will be immediately implementable in their current (or near future) studies and will result in stronger causal findings, providing higher-quality evidence regarding the potential of new innovations to improve STEM education broadly. Additionally, a secondary goal is to...

Effective: 2019-2024

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Tessa C Andrews

Institution: University of Georgia Research Foundation Inc

Active-learning instruction refers to teaching methods that engage students during a significant amount of class time in work designed to help them learn. When compared with traditional lecturing, studies have shown that active-learning instruction can enhance students' science learning. Active learning is also associated with increased retention of underrepresented minorities in science courses. However, studies also show that the learning gains achieved in active-learning classrooms vary...

Effective: 2019-2024

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Benjamin Zwickl

Institution: Rochester Institute of Tech

This CAREER project investigates learning and assessment of problem-solving in context-rich settings, such as research laboratories, project-based courses, and STEM workplaces. It includes an education plan focused on transferring the research to improve education. Because these context-rich, problem-solving experiences more closely mimic professional work, they offer important venues for STEM workforce development. However, these environments tend to be resource and time-intensive compared to...

Effective: 2019-2024

Funding Type: Other

Principal Investigator: Philip L Bell

Institution: University of Washington

This project will examine how partnerships among state science leaders, education researchers and education practitioners cultivate vertical coherence and equity in state science education. This is an important study because in most states, the student population is becoming more diverse, and states need help in finding ways to better serve schools and districts within their jurisdictions. Through this effort, state science leaders will participate in a networked improvement community model...

Effective: 2019-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Ross J Benbow

Institution: University of Wisconsin-Madison

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Student military service members and veterans, who are undergraduate students, face numerous medical, financial and social obstacles that universities and communities must address to prevent this skilled talent pool from leaving STEM before entering, or re-entering, our nation's workforce. For example, many service members and veterans have family or work...

Effective: 2019-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Heather Griller Clark, Michael Krezmien

Institutions: Arizona State University, University of Massachusetts Amherst

The project will investigate the impact of a Universal Design for Learning (UDL) App-based curriculum on STEM career knowledge, interests, competencies, and readiness for incarcerated youth. Integrating STEM into Transition Education for Incarcerated Learners (INSITE) will integrate STEM workforce development activities into Merging Worlds, an empirically supported transition program, and deliver it through a UDL App-based framework to prepare and support STEM career readiness and employment...

Effective: 2019-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Heather Hill

Institution: Harvard University

The long-term goal of this project, funded by EHR's Core Research Program, is to guide and support teacher education programs. Significant research work is currently available about how to best train STEM K-12 teachers. As a result, it is an appropriate time to reflect on what educational researchers have already learned and plan for new research designs and methods that can sustain and extend improvements in STEM teacher education. This project will work with STEM teacher educators to study...

Effective: 2019-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Matthew T Hora

Institution: University of Wisconsin-Madison

Internships and other forms of experiential and work-based learning are increasingly a common feature of STEM education in the United States and are all central to the goal of preparing a STEM workforce for the 21st century. In focusing on access and equity related to internship participation, this study will be one of the first to empirically explore these issues, which are of increasing concern to higher education scholars.The University of Wisconsin-Madison's Center for College-Workforce...

Effective: 2019-2021

Funding Type: BCSER IID

Principal Investigator: Ramon Goings

Institutions: University of Maryland Baltimore County, Loyola University Maryland, Inc.

This project will support fundamental STEM education research that examines broadening participation within the STEM teacher workforce. By investigating the factors that influence undergraduate student persistence in STEM and teacher education, it has the potential to contribute new knowledge about the recruitment and retention of underrepresented minority pre-service STEM teachers. The investigator has designed a professional development plan that will support building his capacity to do...

Effective: 2018-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: IVORY A TOLDSON

Institution: QUALITY EDUCATION FOR MINORITIES NETWORK

The Quality Education for Minorities (QEM) Network, in collaboration with the American Institutes for Research (AIR), is studying a model aligned with the successful graduation of undergraduate STEM students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) who go on to earn doctoral degrees. The primary objective of this research is to advance understanding about the characteristics of HBCUs that enable STEM undergraduate students to thrive and prepare them to subsequently pursue and...

Effective: 2018-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Benjamin Kelcey

Institution: University of Cincinnati Main Campus

There is widespread recognition that research on malleable teacher attributes represents a critical component of the foundational knowledge necessary to improve and advance STEM education. A method of research to understand how teachers affect students is mediation analyses. Mediation analyses decode how and why attributes are connected to student improvement by probing the intermediate developmental processes and behaviors of teachers that operationalize these relationships. Multi-school or...

Effective: 2018-2024

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Samantha Daley

Institution: University of Rochester

This Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) project will pursue integrated research and education efforts to broaden participation, persistence, and success in advanced science coursework and career progression for students with learning disabilities, the largest disability category in United States' public education. Despite the potential for academic and career success in STEM, students with learning disabilities participate in advanced science courses and pursue STEM careers at much lower...

Effective: 2018-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Nadya A Fouad

Institution: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

The study examines how the interaction of diversity and engineering team dynamics impact innovation in the workplace. The investigators apply the Categorization Elaboration Model (CEM) to investigate why simply including women or racial/ethnic minorities on engineering teams does not lead automatically to greater innovation. The model reconciles the inconsistent literature on team diversity and team performance and addresses the fundamental question of when and how team diversity can have a...

Effective: 2018-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Heather L Thiry

Institution: University of Colorado at Boulder

Given their accessibility and affordability, community colleges attract high numbers of minority, low-income, and first-generation students. Despite their potential to diversify the STEM workforce, few studies have sought to capture how community colleges serve underrepresented students in STEM courses and degree programs. Further, there is a limited understanding of what leads underrepresented community college students to transfer to and attain STEM degrees from four-year institutions. Taking...

Effective: 2018-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: David F Feldon

Institution: Utah State University

The proposed project will examine the linkage between graduate skill development and postgraduate career outcomes by (1) identifying the ways in which the development of research skills and professional goals during graduate training may predict postdoctoral career attainment and trajectories, (2) examining the capacity of postdoctoral research positions to serve as inflection points in early career researchers' career trajectories, and (3) characterizing the extent to which demographic...

Effective: 2018-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Dustin B Thoman

Institution: San Diego State University Foundation

This study will investigate the factors that facilitate or hinder STEM undergraduate instructors from implementing strategies that have demonstrably positive impacts on student outcomes. The research will specifically focus on the study of one such intervention called the Utility Value Intervention (UVI), which has been shown to have a positive impact especially on students who are first generation college students or who are from racial and ethnic minority groups that are underrepresented in...

Effective: 2018-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Amy D Robertson Jr

Institution: Seattle Pacific University

This ECR project will explore the extent to which educational strategies, tools, and materials in undergraduate physics classrooms and laboratory sessions center some students and marginalize others. This project will identify teaching strategies, tools, and materials that communicate who is welcome, important, and influential in physics and what characteristics are valued and necessary for success in physics. The ways that undergraduate physics is taught may lead to reduced persistence and...

Effective: 2018-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Krystal Hinerman, Eric M Riggs, Julie M Sexton

Institutions: Lamar University, Texas A&M University, University of Colorado at Boulder, University of Northern Colorado

The representation of women in the earth, atmospheric, and ocean sciences workforce is significantly lower than that of female undergraduate students majoring in these disciplines. This underrepresentation limits the available role models for female undergraduate and graduate students, and female scientists working in industry. It is critical to understand the factors that may influence why male or female undergraduate students pursue the STEM workforce or not. Advancing a diverse and...

Effective: 2018-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: James Minogue

Institution: North Carolina State University

The need to prepare a skilled and motivated STEM workforce who can meet the demands of a dynamic and complex global economy is a widely recognized national challenge. This project, a cross-institutional collaboration among North Carolina State University, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, and Davidson College, capitalizes on advances in technology to respond to that challenge. It aims to provide empirical evidence on the enhancement of foundational physics concepts of pre-service...

Effective: 2018-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Andrew S Hanks, Kevin M Kniffin

Institutions: Ohio State University, Cornell University

Researchers at Cornell and Ohio State Universities will apply an economic framework to examine the risks, rewards, and benefits of the choice to pursue interdisciplinary dissertation research among early, mid- and later career Ph.D. students and degree holders. Using data from the Survey of Earned Doctorates, Survey of Doctorate Recipients, and the Institute for Research on Innovation & Science, they will compare competing definitions of interdisciplinary research and analyze and map trends...

Effective: 2018-2022

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Jennifer M Bekki, Kerrie G Wilkins-Yel

Institutions: Arizona State University, Indiana University, University of Massachusetts Boston

This study will investigate the associations between perceived supports and persistence for both majority (Caucasian) women and underrepresented minority (URM) women in STEM doctoral programs. Women leave doctoral programs in STEM at higher rates than their white male counterparts. Reducing the attrition of these talented individuals from STEM is of particular importance given that diversity at all levels of the STEM workforce has been shown to benefit the outcomes of related scientific...

Effective: 2018-2022

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Tama Leventhal

Institution: Tufts University

This project seeks to broaden the participation of an important underrepresented group in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). Mexican-origin children, one of the fastest growing segments of the U.S. population, often come from disadvantaged circumstances that increase their need to use public education for social mobility while also posing challenges to navigating the public education system. Yet, Mexican-origin families are rich in social resources that can be leveraged to...

Effective: 2018-2022

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Sandra Simpkins

Institution: University of California-Irvine

High school is a critical turning point in many students' STEM coursework and career trajectories. For example, students' math motivation peaks in high school yet 45% of 10th graders who express interest in pursuing a STEM career lose that interest by the end of high school. Adolescents with minimal math and science high school coursework are extremely unlikely to either try or be able to enter STEM college majors and careers. To change these trends, it is necessary to understand how best to...

Effective: 2018-2022

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Lois Joy

Institution: Jobs for the Future, Inc.

Jobs for the Future is conducting a research project in collaboration with Wested that will examine the impact of STEM work-based-learning (WBL) in community colleges. The researchers will use social cognitive career theory (SCCT) as a framework and mixed-methods design to investigate research questions regarding (1) differences in student participants and motivation to participate in community college STEM work-based-learning, (2) structures of community college STEM WBL opportunities and...

Effective: 2018-2022

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Julia I Lane, Jason Owen-Smith, Bruce A Weinberg

Institutions: New York University, Regents of the University of Michigan - Ann Arbor, Ohio State University

The project is a collaborative effort involving researchers from New York University, Ohio State University, and University of Michigan Ann Arbor who are extending work on a previous project that links multiple data sets to conduct longitudinal analyses of STEM student outcomes. The current project leverages the research infrastructure that was supported by prior awards to examine how peer effects, network connections, and employer demand shape career outcomes for doctoral students. It...

Effective: 2018-2022

Funding Type: Conference

Principal Investigator: Sarah J Fick

Institutions: Washington State University, University of Virginia Main Campus

This project will convene a group of scholars in K-12 science education for a workshop that will lay fundamental conceptual groundwork for research on how crosscutting concepts (CCCs) can inform science teaching and learning. CCCs, along with disciplinary core ideas and scientific practices, reflect a new vision of science proficiency expressed in recent national and state science education frameworks and standards. This vision integrates the "knowing" and "doing" of authentic science and...

Effective: 2018-2021

Funding Type: RAPID/EAGER

Principal Investigator: Odis D Johnson Jr

Institutions: Washington University, Johns Hopkins University

The ECR program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that will generate foundational knowledge in the field. This project will conduct an early stage exploratory study of an untested idea that will address the nation's STEM workforce needs. It will use a radically different approach to uncover barriers that impede broader participation by specific race-gender groups in STEM fields. The study will investigate whether school policies and practices regarding safety, discipline, school...

Effective: 2018-2021

Funding Type: RAPID/EAGER

Principal Investigator: Kathryn H Shows

Institution: Virginia State University

The ECR program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that will generate foundational knowledge in the field. This project will explore an early-stage, untested intervention aimed at promoting ways to help underrepresented minority students succeed in introductory biology courses and persist in STEM careers. The project will study whether combining team-based geocaching gameplay with near-peer mentoring will help students master content and skills in biology. It will also examine...

Effective: 2018-2021

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Maria Ong

Institution: TERC Inc

This project will review and synthesize existing literature on factors that impact the interest, participation, retention and success of women of color in computing and technology fields. This type of project informs areas for future research and helps to identify promising practices that others can implement. The project will result in a report to help inform those who are practitioners in STEM education, STEM employers, and STEM policy makers. This project is a mixed-methods meta-synthesis...

Effective: 2018-2020

Funding Type: Conference

Principal Investigator: William R Penuel

Institution: University of Colorado at Boulder

The ECR program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that will generate foundational knowledge in the field. This conference will provide a venue for state science coordinators from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and US territories and their teams to learn about tools and practices that will help them identify, analyze, and adapt resources that shape educational opportunities in science co-designed through the Advancing Coherent and Equitable Systems of Science Education...

Effective: 2018-2019

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Daniel Kuehn

Institution: Urban Institute

The Urban Institute will conduct an exploratory mixed method study of STEM apprenticeship programs to provide a foundational understanding of the characteristics and performance of STEM apprentices, including the experiences of underrepresented minorities in STEM apprenticeship programs. The proposed research also will investigate the program-level determinants of success, including program design elements that lead to higher completion rates and wage growth for apprentices. Elements of...

Effective: 2018-2019

Funding Type: Conference

Principal Investigator: Julie A Luft

Institution: University of Georgia Research Foundation Inc

This two-day conference addresses a thorny issue in K-12 education, out-of-field science teaching, or the reality that science teachers regularly find themselves responsible for teaching content or in contexts that are outside their area of expertise. For example, teachers who have expertise working with students in the upper elementary grades might find themselves responsible for teaching first grade or kindergarten. Or, teachers with expertise in one area of science might find themselves...

Effective: 2018-2019

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Thomas B Hoffer

Institution: National Opinion Research Center

The National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago will conduct a spring 2019 conference and related preparatory tasks focused on how doctoral-granting universities and their doctoral programs can collect and utilize data on STEM PhD career pathways. The overarching objective of the project is to help develop widely-shared standards for the kind of career outcomes that should be measured; the methods for collecting the data; and the ways in which data should be analyzed...

Effective: 2018-2019

Funding Type: Conference

Principal Investigator: David J Kraemer

Institution: Dartmouth College

Creativity in STEM is the difference between basic competency and innovative advancement. To foster continued innovation, it is essential that we develop new methods to foster students' creative thinking skills in STEM. However, many issues regarding creativity remain unresolved. For example, we know little about how creativity develops, how the brain gives rise to creativity, and what sorts of educational experiences can make a student more creative over time. Indeed, even determining how to...

Effective: 2017-2024

Funding Type: Other

Principal Investigator: Felice J Levine

Institution: American Educational Research Association

This project was submitted in response to EHR Core Research (ECR) program announcement NSF 15-509. The ECR program of fundamental research in STEM education provides funding in critical research areas that are essential, broad and enduring. EHR seeks proposals that will help synthesize, build and/or expand research foundations in the following focal areas: STEM learning, STEM learning environments, STEM workforce development, and broadening participation in STEM. The ECR program is...

Effective: 2017-2024

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Kathleen H Corriveau

Institution: Trustees of Boston University

The United States invests over $600 billion on public K-12 education every year to further the Nation's prosperity and welfare. The National Science Foundation's CAREER program supports junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research, excellent education and the integration of education and research. This CAREER project dissects and characterizes science explanations in formal and informal learning settings to uncover best practices for optimizing...

Effective: 2017-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Lois Weis

Institution: SUNY at Buffalo

Although we have some evidence of the effects of state policy on postsecondary costs, tuition waivers, and earmarked grants for college attendance, we have little evidence of the effects of STEM-specific state policy defined as math and science course requirements for high school graduation, and presence or absence of high-stakes testing on high school opportunities and short and long term outcomes for STEM. Although students interested in STEM pursue varying paths toward STEM degrees and...

Effective: 2017-2024

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Lorraine Males

Institution: University of Nebraska-Lincoln

There are a growing number of curriculum resources available to secondary mathematics teachers and most teachers use curriculum materials in mathematics instruction. This project will investigate how to help pre-service teachers use mathematics curriculum materials purposefully to plan and to teach. A focus of this work is curricular noticing or how teachers interpret and respond to curriculum resources. A component of helping pre-service teachers prepare for the classroom is helping them...

Effective: 2017-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigators: Eric Deemer, Aryn M Dotterer

Institutions: Purdue University, Utah State University

The ECR program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that will generate foundational knowledge in the field. As such, this study will build on an emerging body of research about ways to broaden the representation of the African American undergraduate students in STEM fields. This type of research is highly important since studies show that racial bias weaken scientific identity in STEM by triggering and perpetuating threatening stereotypes that African Americans do not have the...

Effective: 2017-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Jonathan E Cook

Institution: Pennsylvania State Univ University Park

The ECR program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that will generate foundational knowledge in the field. This study will examine whether stress from psychological threat helps explain why nearly half of doctoral students overall and even higher rates of women and underrepresented minority students leave graduate school before attaining their terminal STEM degrees. The proposed research will be guided by the self-affirmation theory in determining whether social psychological...

Effective: 2017-2024

Funding Type: CAREER

Principal Investigator: Yi Zhang

Institution: University of Texas at Arlington

The ECR (Education and Human Resources Core Research) program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that will generate foundational knowledge in the field. As transfer students continue to use community colleges as stepping stones to pursue STEM degrees, it is important to understand the unique challenges these students encounter and the diversity within this important student population. This study will develop a transfer student typology and investigate its relationships with...

Effective: 2017-2024

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Suzanne T Ortega

Institution: Council of Graduate Schools

The Council of Graduate Schools will collect and analyze detailed quantitative data of STEM doctoral students and alumni at different phases of their careers to determine if those who pursue academic positions have fundamentally different career progression, values, or work responsibilities compared to those who seek and hold nonacademic jobs. The project will track career pathways for alumni cohorts three, eight, and 15 years from PhD degree award from 15 STEM doctoral granting institutions to...

Effective: 2017-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Eric W Welch

Institution: Arizona State University

A team of researchers from Arizona State University, Georgia Institute of Technology, and the University of Arkansas will investigate factors affecting the retention of foreign STEM higher education faculty in the US and those factors leading to their being more productive members of the workforce and advancing STEM in this country. In an era of global competition for academic STEM talent, and despite the high representation of foreign STEM faculty in US post-secondary institutions, significant...

Effective: 2017-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Gerald R Marschke

Institution: National Bureau of Economic Research Inc

The National Bureau of Economic Research will create a new database to measure the labor market outcomes of STEM PhDs and postdocs. The research will measure flows of STEM graduates into different economic sectors, estimate the returns on educational investments for STEM PhDs and postdocs, and analyze the determinants of STEM labor demand in industry. The study will formulate and estimate new models of labor demand based on state-of-the-art econometric methods and innovative identification...

Effective: 2017-2023

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Mary Blair-Loy

Institution: University of California-San Diego

The underrepresentation of women faculty in STEM limits the potential for scientific creativity and reduces available role models for female undergraduate and graduate students pursuing STEM careers. Research on implicit bias indicates that women candidates for faculty positions are less likely to be selected than men. It is critical to understand the experiences of hiring committee members, and of candidates for faculty positions, in order to advance STEM academic hiring practices. Having a...

Effective: 2017-2022

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Lucas C Parra

Institution: CUNY City College

When a teacher is presenting new material during class or online, are students actually paying attention? The ambitious goal of this project is to objectively measure students' attentional engagement during learning using electroencephalography (EEG). Specifically, it measures students' brain activity as they watch online educational videos, and then compares their neural activity to how well they perform on traditional measures of learning such as tests and quizzes. If successful, this project...

Effective: 2017-2022

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Nora S Newcombe

Institution: Temple University

People with strong spatial skills are more likely to show interest and success in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). Fortunately, spatial skills are malleable, and improvements in them are durable and generalizable. Increasing spatial skills during educational training may be one route towards increasing the STEM workforce. However, there are two gaps in current knowledge. First, existing research concentrates almost exclusively on small-scale spatial skills such as...

Effective: 2017-2022

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: Dan Goldhaber

Institution: American Institutes for Research in the Behavioral Sciences

There is a shortage of STEM teachers in middle and high schools and a concern about improving the efficacy of STEM teachers. Despite a tremendous investment in interventions targeted to the existing STEM teacher workforce, our nation has made little progress in identifying specific interventions that can improve STEM teacher effectiveness or increase the probability that individuals trained to be STEM teachers actually enter the public teaching workforce. By focusing exclusively on preservice...

Effective: 2017-2021

Funding Type: ECR:Core

Principal Investigator: David S Knight

Institutions: University of Washington, University of Texas at El Paso

Maintaining U.S. global competitiveness in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) industries requires increasing participation among traditionally underrepresented groups including people of color and women. Studies show creating more equal educational opportunities in the K-12 education system is an effective, socially just approach to expanding STEM participation. This study examines the impact of Texas Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (T-STEM) academies on (a) STEM...