| NSF Org: |
OIA OIA-Office of Integrative Activities |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | September 8, 2017 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | September 8, 2017 |
| Award Number: | 1744477 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Bernice Anderson
banderso@nsf.gov (703)292-5151 OIA OIA-Office of Integrative Activities O/D Office Of The Director |
| Start Date: | January 1, 2018 |
| End Date: | September 30, 2020 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $299,824.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $299,824.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
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| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
1601 E MARKET ST GREENSBORO NC US 27411 (336)334-7995 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
1601 E Market St Greensboro NC US 27411-0001 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
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| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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| Parent UEI: |
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| NSF Program(s): | Eddie Bernice Johnson INCLUDES |
| Primary Program Source: |
04001718DB NSF Education & Human Resource |
| Program Reference Code(s): |
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| Program Element Code(s): |
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| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.083 |
ABSTRACT
EMERGE in STEM (Education for Minorities to Effectively Raise Graduation and Employment in STEM) is a NSF INCLUDES Design and Development Launch Pilot. This project addresses the broadening participation challenge of increasing participation of women, the at-risk minority population, and the deaf in the STEM workforce. The project incorporates in and out-of-school career awareness activities for grades 4-12 in a high poverty community in Guilford County, North Carolina. EMERGE in STEM brings together a constellation of existing community partners from all three sectors (public, private, government) to leverage and expand mutually reinforcing STEM career awareness and workforce development activities in new ways by using a collective impact approach.
This project builds on a local network to infuse career exposure elements into the existing mutually reinforcing STEM activities and interventions in the community. A STEM education and career exposure software, Learning Blade, will be used to reach approximately 15,000 students. A shared measurement system and assessment process will contribute to the evaluation of the effectiveness of the collective impact strategies, the implementation of mutually reinforcing activities across the partnership and the extent to which project efforts attract students to consider STEM careers.
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.
EMERGE in STEM (Education for Minorities to Effectively Raise Graduation and Employment in STEM) addressed the broadening-participation challenge of increasing the number of women and at-risk minority population in the STEM workforce. The project incorporated in- and out-of-school career awareness activities for grades 4-12 in an underserved community in Guilford County, North Carolina. EMERGE in STEM brought together a constellation of existing community partners from three sectors (public, private, government) to leverage and expand mutually-reinforcing STEM career awareness and workforce development activities in new ways by using a collective-impact approach.
This Project advanced knowledge in understanding, designing, implementing, and assessing an innovative and transformative collective-impact model for STEM education. The Pilot outcome contributed to the state-of-the-art in STEM education through understanding how career knowledge and exposure can broaden participation of underrepresented minorities (URMs) in the STEM pipeline.
This project leveraged a local network to infuse career-exposure elements into the existing mutually-reinforcing STEM activities and interventions in the community. The central hypothesis studied was that innovative and persistent exposure to exciting STEM career opportunities, throughout the grade 4-12 continuum, would support expanded STEM workforce diversity. This Project focused on the opportunity to consistently, persistently, and collaboratively expose grades 4-12 students to the wonderful, high-paying, interesting and exciting jobs in the STEM workforce.
The Partners in this Project included academic institutions (North Carolina A&T State University (Lead), UNC Greensboro, Guilford County Schools, Greensboro Public Library, Guilford Technical Community College); an educational software provider (Thinking Media/Learning Blade software); state of NC STEM education organizations (NC Department of Public Instruction, NC STEM); industrial network organizations (Greensboro Chamber of Commerce, Action Greensboro, Launch Greensboro), and an external educational evaluator (Strategic Evaluations, Inc.).
A STEM education and career exposure software, Learning Blade, was used to reach approximately 3,000 middle-school students. Additionally, other out-of-school STEM interventions were delivered to students to determine the effects of different intensities and duration of exposure to STEM career opportunities. Over 15,000 students participated in STEM interventions over the two years of the project. A shared measurement system (S-STEM from NCSU Friday Institute) and assessment process was used to evaluate the effectiveness of the collective-impact strategies, the implementation of mutually-reinforcing activities across the partnership, and the extent to which project efforts attracted students to consider STEM careers. Unfortunately, the S-STEM assessment tool did not provide statistically significant outcomes from the STEM interventions. Nevertheless, anecdotal evidence existed that showed a growing interest in STEM pathways for the students that participated in the project.
The societal benefits and outcomes from this STEM Project included:
- increased participation of women and underrepresented minorities in STEM;
- improved STEM education and educator development for grades 4-12 (teachers and administrators were supported by this Project to infuse career exposure into their STEM programs in-school and out-of-school; Middle School teachers learned to use Learning Blade STEM software, which may become a standard across the state of NC in the future);
- increased public engagement with science and technology from parents and community (thru education, counseling, and communications the Project helped deliver the right messages to students;
- improved well-being of individuals in society (supported continuation of STEM pathways in school toward the STEM workforce);
- developed a more diverse, globally competitive STEM workforce (URMs were the focus of Project);
- increased partnerships between academia, industry, and government; and
- enhanced infrastructure for research and education (the Project developed a set of tools and resources to be used by others across the nation).
Last Modified: 12/01/2020
Modified by: Gregory H Monty
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