1) Do the rates of STEM declaration and graduation vary between high schools?
2) Do opportunities to learn science and mathematics vary depending on high schools’ racial composition? 3) What is the relationship between high school racial composition, opportunities to learn available at high schools, and students’ STEM participation in college? 4) Do these relationships vary by racial/ethnic groups?
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The Role of High School Racial Composition and Opportunities to Learn in Students' STEM College Participation
Undergraduate STEM Instructors’ Teacher Identities and Discourses on Student Gender Expression and Equity
The authors investigated how STEM faculty teaching first-year engineering courses constructed teacher identities and responsibilities. Our research questions included: What discourses do faculty use to construct the meaning of student gender expression in their classroom? How do faculty discursively position themselves in relation to gender equity? What teacher identities and responsibilities do they construct through these discourses?
The Roots of STEM Achievement: An Analysis of Persistence and Attainment in STEM Majors
1. What factors predict that incoming STEM majors who graduate will attain a STEM degree?
2. What elements affect incoming STEM majors’ persistence in college?
3. What variables influence non-STEM majors who graduate college to switch to and attain a degree in a STEM field?
4. What factors motivate undecided majors to declare and graduate with a STEM degree?
Female Faculty Role Models, Self-efficacy and Student Achievement
This study estimates the effect of having a female instructor, the effects of measures of self-efficacy, and the interaction effects of measures of self-efficacy and having a female instructor on female and male student grade performance.
Choice of Majors: Are Women Really Different from Men?
– High school academic preparation, faculty gender composition, and major returns have little effect on major switching behaviors, and women and men are equally likely to change their major in response to poor grades in major-related courses.
– Women in male-dominated majors do not exhibit different patterns of switching behaviors relative to their male colleagues.
– Women are more likely to switch out of male-dominated STEM majors in response to poor performance compared to men.
– It takes multiple signals of lack of fit into a major (low grades, gender composition of class, and external stereotyping signals) to impel female students to switch majors.
Women in Technology: College Experiences that are Correlated with Long-term Career Success
The purpose of this study is to identify key college experiences that are correlated with long-term success for female technologists. Research questions include whether long-term career success is more likely for female technology graduates who, during their undergraduate studies, (1) personally interacted with professional and academic role models, (2) were able to apply their classroom learning to real world problems, and (3) actively participated in campus life.
Laying the Tracks for Successful Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Education: What Can We Learn from Comparisons of Immigrant-Native Achievement in the USA?
This paper examines the immigrant-native achievement gap in science, technology,
engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields in college in the USA.
Family Socioeconomic Status and Choice of STEM Major in College: An Analysis of a National Sample
Does students’ decision of STEM enrollment in college differ systematically by family SES?
Can learning communities boost success of women and minorities in STEM? Evidence from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
– Author finds no statistically significant effects on academic outcomes for ESG enrollees generally, but women who participate in the program have higher GPAs and complete more credits of coursework.
– Minority students are more likely to major in math, computer science, or electrical engineering after participating in the ESG program.
– Though quite noisy, the results are suggestive that women and minorities in STEM may benefit from learning communities.
– Author finds evidence that female instructors are particularly beneficial for female students at MIT. However, the magnitude of the estimates suggests that the gender-mix of ESG instructors cannot account for most of the academic effects the author observes for female students.
Decomposing the Racial Gap in STEM Major Attrition: A Course-Level Investigation
This paper examines differences in STEM retention between minority and non-minority
undergraduate students. It examines the role of ability in the switching decision and timing, they estimate STEM and non-STEM ability, and then compare the joint distribution of students who switch out of STEM versus STEM stayers.
STEM Field Persistence: The Impact of Engagement on Postsecondary STEM Persistence for Underrepresented Minority Students
1) Do the BPS:04/09 data support that underrepresented minority students leave STEM fields? 2) Does the BPS:04/09 demonstrate differential engagement for underrepresented minority students in STEM fields? 3) Do the differing engagement behaviors contribute to STEM attrition of underrepresented minorities?
Exposure to School and Classroom Racial Segregation in Charlotte-Mecklenburg High Schools and Students College Achievement
1. Do the effects of school racial segregation extend into early college outcomes among students graduating from CMS schools and entering the UNC system?
2. Is minority representation in the upper-track classes related to students’ first year college achievement?
3. Do the levels of within-school segregation due to tracking exacerbate the negative effects of attending a segregated black high school?
Gender Differences in Learning Outcomes from the College Experiences of Engineering Students
1) How do curricular emphases differently affect engineering learning outcomes by gender? 2) How do instructional approaches differently affect engineering learning outcomes by gender? 3) How does participation in co-curricular experiences differently affect engineering learning outcomes by gender?
Understanding the Changing Dynamics of the Gender Gap in Undergraduate Engineering Majors: 1971-2011
This paper examines the level and determinants of students’ plans to major in engineering when entering college. (1) How has the gender gap in incoming college students’ intent to major in engineering changed over the past 4 decades? (2) What are the determinants of women’s and men’s decision to major in engineering versus all other fields? To what extent have these determinants and/or their salience changed over time for women and men? (3) To what extent is the gender gap in the selection of engineering due to (a) gender differences in attributes, versus (b) gender differences in the salience of these attributes? How has this changed over time?
STEM as "Minority": A Phenomenological Case Study of How Students of Color Perceive Their Experience in a STEM Living-Learning Program
To gain understanding of the experiences of students of color in a STEM living-learning program.
Considering the Interest-Convergence Dilemma in STEM Education
Focuses on what barriers still exist in diversity programs that are focused on STEM.
Growing the Roots of STEM Majors: Female Math and Science High School Faculty and the Participation of Students in STEM
What is the role of the demographics of high school faculty, more specifically the proportion of female math and science teachers, on college students’ decisions to declare and/or major in STEM?
An Investigation of the Linkage Between Technology-Based Activities and STEM Major Selection in 4-Year Postsecondary Institutions in the United States: Multilevel Structural Equation Modelling
1) To what extent do technology-based activities affect students’ selections of STEM majors in 4-year postsecondary institutions at the student level, taking into account math performance, gender, racial/ethnic background, and socioeconomic status (SES)? 2) To what extent do technology-based activities and technology-based school environment affect students ‘selections of STEM majors in 4-year postsecondary institutions at the school level, taking into account math performance, gender, racial/ethnic background, and SES?
Moving Latino/a Students into STEM Majors in College: The Role of Teachers and Professional Communities in Secondary Schools
This research focuses on the predictors of STEM majors in college, focusing specifically on Latino/a students. Also, it examines the effectiveness of collaborative teaching communities in secondary schools. Lastly, this research focuses on teacher satisfaction and teaching practices on student outcomes.
Perceived Mathematical Ability under Challenge: A Longitudinal Perspective on Sex Segregation among STEM Degree Fields
1) To what degree do domain-specific and domain-general perceptions of ability under challenge differ by gender? 2) What is the relationship between perceived ability under challenge in mathematics and advanced high school science course enrollment? 3) To what extent does perceived ability under challenge in mathematics predict staying in a STEM field as intended before entering postsecondary education? How is this relationship moderated by gender? 4) What is the relationship between perceived ability under challenge in mathematics and selection of mathematics-intensive science majors (physics, engineering, mathematics, and computer science(PEMC), and how is that relationship moderated by gender?
College Admissions Viewbooks and the Grammar of Gender, Race, and STEM
This study aims to critically examine representations of gender, race, and STEM in college admissions viewbooks.
High School Socioeconomic Composition and College Choice: Multilevel Mediation Via Organizational Habitus, School, Practices, Peer and Staff Attitudes
1) Is high school socioeconomic composition (SEC) predictive of students’ college choice?
2) Does SEC have a direct effect on college choice and indirect effects mediated by college choice organizational habitus (CCOH) related school practices and peer, family, and staff attitudes?
3) To what degree do direct and indirect effects of SEC depend on student and school input characteristics?
Course-Taking Patterns of Community College Students Beginning in STEM: Using Data Mining Techniques to Reveal Viable STEM Transfer Pathways
This study examines the course-taking trajectories of beginning community college students, and the resulting transfer outcomes as related to STEM. The following question guides this research: What course-taking patterns are most contributive to upward transfer in STEM fields?
STEM Education
Review and discuss current research on STEM education in the United States, drawing on recent research in sociology and related fields.
Expectancy-Value Models of the STEM Persistence Plans of Ninth-Grade, High-Ability Students: A Comparison Between Black, Hispanic, and White Students
Examine the relationships of demographic and expectancy-value variables with STEM persistence status.
Cohort changes in the relationship between adolescents' family attitudes, STEM intentions and attainment
1) Are family attitudes less likely to constrain young women’s STEM intentions and attainment in the 1990s, as compared to the 1970s? 2) Alternatively, did the effect of family attitudes become less gendered during this period, such that family attitudes constrained both women’s and men’s STEM intentions and attainment among the 1992 cohort?
Experimental Evidence on the Effect of Childhood Investments on Postsecondary Attainment and Degree Completion
Does having a small class size in K through 3rd have an impact on postsecondary outcomes?
Science Identity Trajectories of Latecomers to Science in College
- What trends in science identity trajectories are latecomers to science able to construct during their first year in a college science program?
- How are latecomers’ identity trajectories constrained by or improvised with the cultural models and associated resources available in the figured world of a college science program?
Social Class and the STEM Career Pipeline: An Ethnographic Investigation of Opportunity Structures in High-Poverty Versus Affluent High School
1) What are the mechanisms through which high school opportunity structures link to student choice of STEM major and college destination? 2) To what extent and in what ways do high school opportunity structures differ in schools with a large upper/middle class White population versus a comprehensive urban school (with a STEM focus) with a high population of poor and working class students of color? 3) To what extent do the mechanisms through which the high school opportunity structures link to college major choice and college destination differ in the two schools under investigation?
High School Economic Composition and College Persistence
The authors examine variation in college persistence according to the economic composition of high schools, which serves as a proxy for unmeasured high school attributes that are conductive to postsecondary success.
Does Immigration Affect whether U.S. Natives Major in Science and Engineering?
Does the amount of immigrants have an impact on the amount of U.S. natives that major in STEM?
High School Socioeconomic Segregation and Student Attainment
1) To what degree do student attainment, academic and family background, and school factors vary in low, medium, and high SEC schools? 2) What is the total effect of socioeconomic composition (SEC) on each attainment outcome and to what degree do student factors, peer influences, and school effects mediate the SEC-attainment associations? 3) Is the effect of SEC consistent for students from different SES and ethnic backgrounds?