| NSF Org: |
EES Div. of Equity for Excellence in STEM |
| Recipient: |
|
| Initial Amendment Date: | September 27, 2010 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | May 16, 2014 |
| Award Number: | 1027655 |
| Award Instrument: | Continuing Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Mark Leddy
EES Div. of Equity for Excellence in STEM EDU Directorate for STEM Education |
| Start Date: | October 1, 2010 |
| End Date: | September 30, 2019 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $1,511,464.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $1,639,344.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
FY 2011 = $303,305.00 FY 2012 = $127,880.00 FY 2013 = $304,332.00 FY 2014 = $308,835.00 |
| History of Investigator: |
|
| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
926 DALNEY ST NW ATLANTA GA US 30318-6395 (404)894-4819 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
|
| Primary Place of Performance: |
926 DALNEY ST NW ATLANTA GA US 30318-6395 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
|
| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
|
| Parent UEI: |
|
| NSF Program(s): | Disabilities Research in STEM |
| Primary Program Source: |
04001112DB NSF Education & Human Resource 04001213DB NSF Education & Human Resource 04001314DB NSF Education & Human Resource 04001415DB NSF Education & Human Resource |
| Program Reference Code(s): |
|
| Program Element Code(s): |
|
| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.076 |
ABSTRACT
The University of Georgia and Georgia Institute of Technology are collaborating partners with University of in a proposal to create the Georgia STEM Accessibility Alliance (GSAA). GSAA aims to establish an alliance between Georgia Institute of Technology, the University of Georgia, Georgia Perimeter College and three public secondary school districts. All project activities support the goal of increasing the postsecondary STEM degree and career attainment of individuals with disabilities. The GSAA?s goals relate to increasing the number of secondary students with disabilities (SWD) enrolling in STEM postsecondary classes and majors, increasing the retention and graduation rates of individuals with disabilities in postsecondary STEM majors, and increasing successful entry rates of GSAA students into STEM graduate programs. A distinctive feature of GSAA is the use of a virtual world as the primary service-delivery model. The use of virtual mentoring and teaching, social networking, academic support, transition assistance, and preparation of instructions will be the primary interventions utilized in GSAA. GSAA goals are:
Goal 1: Develop and evaluate GSAA intervention technologies and materials in Year 1 for use in Years 2-5. All modular materials will be made available via the Virtual Learning Reserves, one Reserve for secondary students and faculty and one for post-secondary students and faculty.
Goal 2: Increase the number of secondary SwD (40/per year/140 total) participating in the GSAA STEM mentoring and virtual world STEM activities and entering STEM postsecondary programs in two-year colleges, technical colleges or university partner institutions (50% of participants, or 20 per project year, 80 total). Entering is defined as matriculating with a stated major in a STEM-related field.
Goal 3: Increase retention in STEM majors by 180 students (baseline of 2,479 SWD, 723 SWD with declared STEM majors) and number of students graduating with STEM degrees (associates, baccalaureate, and graduate degrees) by 10 students from 2007 baseline (baseline of 94 students) in GSAA?s two-year college and university partner institutions through peer and faculty virtual and mentoring activities, evidence-based STEM learning practices, UDL solutions, and professional development initiatives.
Goal 4: Increase the entry of GSAA STEM graduates (associates, baccalaureate and graduate) into STEM graduate programs by 10 per year from baseline measures (71 students) in Years 2-5.
The project will implement interventions to support SWD as they cross three critical academic junctures: high school to two-year college; two-year to four-year college; and undergraduate education to graduate education or employment. GSAA activities include:
1. Creating a mentoring/training island in the virtual world of Second Life and integrating social networking tools to all participants year-round mentoring experiences;
2. Providing evidence-based STEM learning strategies with application of skills to STEM content via STEM Learning Seminars and Virtual Learning Communities for SWD;
3. Enhancing the STEM faculty and staff ability to educate SWD using web-based and Second Life training modules to provide core professional training and development;
4. Providing transition preparation and ongoing support to develop self-advocacy and academic skills essential for SWD to succeed in STEM secondary and postsecondary institutions.
Work by internal and external/independent evaluators will provide formative and summative evaluation for the project which will provide evidence for the GSAA model. Dr. Tom McKlin of The Findings Group will provide external evaluation services to the project. Virtual world development and maintenance will be provided by Vesuvius, Inc.
The project will develop materials for replicating the model nation-wide at secondary and postsecondary institutions. Recruiting processes, participant training methods, evaluation feedback instruments, and outcome measures will be formalized so that they can become easy to use for scale-up. GSAA materials and resources will be easily available via the Web to other institutions that seek to replicate the project model. GSAA will seek to apply scale-up first to other Alliances. Once this has been measured and documented, the project will apply efforts to scale up to other organizations outside of this funding directorate
PUBLICATIONS PRODUCED AS A RESULT OF THIS RESEARCH
Note:
When clicking on a Digital Object Identifier (DOI) number, you will be taken to an external
site maintained by the publisher. Some full text articles may not yet be available without a
charge during the embargo (administrative interval).
Some links on this page may take you to non-federal websites. Their policies may differ from
this site.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
The Georgia STEM Accessibility Alliance (GSAA) and its BreakThru project is an NSF-funded Research in Disabilities Education (RDE) Alliance led by the University of Georgia (UGA) and Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech), in partnership with Georgia Perimeter College (GPC, now Perimeter College of Georgia State University) and three Georgia public secondary school systems.
GSAA, in collaboration with Vesuvius Group, LLC, developed Mentoring Islands in the virtual world of Second Life, where students meet and interact with mentors to address their STEM education needs. Students have the option to create avatars that simulate their disability realities (e.g., wheelchairs for mobility, orientation tools for blindness, etc.) or create a personal avatar that is entirely different from their physical self. This virtual environment exemplifies the best of accessible and universal design, with special care taken to accommodate assistive technologies (e.g., screen readers) and nonstandard web browsers. It was supported by an electronic mentoring (e-mentoring) program to recruit, train, and retain qualified mentors.
Overall, this work was important in that it 1) sought to add more students with disabilities to the ranks of STEM scientists; 2) provided a widely-available, virtual learning space; and 3) offered a system to evaluate the success of virtual learning and support environments for students with disabilities.
Between 2011 and 2015, 297 secondary and post-secondary students applied to participate in the BreakThru program. Of these, 189 were accepted and 168 enrolled in the program. On average, students participated in the program for 1.9 years, with students entering the program from a 4-year Post Secondary institution less likely to persist in the program than students from other institution types. Overall, these findings indicate that students in Secondary and 2-year Post Secondary institutions may derive more value from persisting in the program than students in 4-year Post Secondary institutions.
When comparing mentor and mentee responses, it is evident that mentors had less favorable perceptions of their mentees' support seeking behaviors than mentees did. Generally, mentors' perceptions of mentees' support seeking behaviors were rated below the optimal average. Overall, the data suggests that mentees viewed e-mentoring as very effective in providing them with academic and personal support to obtain necessary resources, solve problems, and make important life decisions. These findings are consistent across gender, race/ethnicity, and institution type; support seeking behavior does not significantly differ across demographic groups.
The Theory of Change for GSAA suggests that there is a positive, directional association between mentor support and participants' attitudinal gains. That is, to the extent that the program provides quality mentor support, participants will show an increase in internal attitudes. Dosage, or the length of time in the program, will positively influence students' attitudinal growth. As students persist in the program and experience more support from their mentors, their attitudes and intentions to persist in STEM will concomitantly increase.
Results suggest that satisfaction with the mentoring relationship positively and statistically significantly predicts growth in Intent to Persist and Self-Determination. Personal Responsibility, the degree to which the mentor enhances interpersonal development, statistically significantly predicts growth in Self-Advocacy and Positive Math Attitudes. Overall, these findings suggest that mentoring is effective at enhancing mentees' psychosocial attitudes. That is, mentees exhibit growth in Intent to Persist, Self-Determination, and Self-Advocacy to the extent that they are satisfied by the mentoring relationship and/or view the mentoring experience as beneficial to their interpersonal development. Dosage does not influence change in attitudes.
Virtual worlds such as the BreakThru Second Life islands provide an interactive, graphically rich experience to participants seeking that level of immersion. While the available technology does present several barriers to accessibility, appropriate training and use of open-source accommodations can alleviate those barriers and allow for a unique E-mentoring experience not available through more traditional methods. However, BreakThru research indicates that, at this time, virtual worlds must be supported through communication via other methods.
Students will generally default to using methods of communication that are faster and more familiar. Participants overwhelmingly reported using audio telephone calls, SMS and email. Secondary participants reported particularly significant use of SMS (texting). These three options are each available from mobile devices with full functionality, whereas Second Life mobile clients sacrifice graphical fidelity and several features in order to adapt to mobile platforms. This strips away several of the advantages virtual worlds might have over other mobile communications methods.
The results of BreakThru suggest that virtual worlds are most useful to students as a supplementary platform with a high level of specialized content available.
Last Modified: 12/30/2019
Modified by: Nathan W Moon
Please report errors in award information by writing to: awardsearch@nsf.gov.
