scholarly journals Situating Second-Year Success: Understanding Second-Year STEM Experiences at a Liberal Arts College

2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. ar43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leslie Gregg-Jolly ◽  
Jim Swartz ◽  
Ellen Iverson ◽  
Joyce Stern ◽  
Narren Brown ◽  
...  

Challenges particular to second-year students have been identified that can impact persistence in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. We implemented a program to improve student success in intermediate-level science courses by helping students to feel they belonged and could succeed in STEM. We used survey measures of perceptions and attitudes and then qualitative measures to characterize the impact of support strategies, including peer mentoring, a second-year science student retreat, learning and advising support resources, and department-specific activities. Analysis of registration and transcript information revealed underperformance by students of color (SOC) and first-generation (FG) students in 200-level science courses. Comparison of these data before and during programming revealed significant improvement in success rates of these students in 200-level biology and chemistry courses, but success rates of SOC and FG students remain lower than the overall rate for 200-level science courses. Contemporaneous with the program, qualitative and quantitative measures of student attitudes revealed a high level of belongingness and support. The results suggest that a focus on students’ metacognition about their own abilities and strategic knowledge of how to succeed may be a fruitful direction for future research.

Author(s):  
Mateusz Iwo Dubaniowski ◽  
Hans Rudolf Heinimann

A system-of-systems (SoS) approach is often used for simulating disruptions to business and infrastructure system networks allowing for integration of several models into one simulation. However, the integration is frequently challenging as each system is designed individually with different characteristics, such as time granularity. Understanding the impact of time granularity on propagation of disruptions between businesses and infrastructure systems and finding the appropriate granularity for the SoS simulation remain as major challenges. To tackle these, we explore how time granularity, recovery time, and disruption size affect the propagation of disruptions between constituent systems of an SoS simulation. To address this issue, we developed a high level architecture (HLA) simulation of three networks and performed a series of simulation experiments. Our results revealed that time granularity and especially recovery time have huge impact on propagation of disruptions. Consequently, we developed a model for selecting an appropriate time granularity for an SoS simulation based on expected recovery time. Our simulation experiments show that time granularity should be less than 1.13 of expected recovery time. We identified some areas for future research centered around extending the experimental factors space.


Author(s):  
Diarmaid Lane ◽  
Sheryl Sorby

AbstractIn recent years, there has been a surge in research in spatial thinking across the international community. We now know that spatial skills are malleable and that they are linked to success across multiple disciplines, most notably Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). While spatial skills have been examined by cognitive scientists in laboratory environments for decades, current research is examining how these skills can be developed in field-based environments. In this paper, we present findings from a study within a Technology Teacher preparation programme where we examined first-year students’ spatial skills on entry to university. We explain why it was necessary to embed a spatial skills intervention into Year 1 of the programme and we describe the impact that this had on students’ spatial scores and on academic performance. The findings from our study highlight a consistent gender gap in spatial scores at the start of the first-year with female students entering the Technology Teacher preparation programme at a lower base level than male students. We describe how we integrated spatial development activities into an existing course and how an improvement in spatial scores and overall course performance was observed. The paper concludes by discussing the long-term sustainability of integrating spatial interventions within teacher preparation programmes while also highlighting the importance of future research to examine spatial skills as a fundamental component of technological capability.


2009 ◽  
Vol 27 (24) ◽  
pp. 4014-4020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Goss ◽  
Michael P. Link ◽  
Suanna S. Bruinooge ◽  
Theodore S. Lawrence ◽  
Joel E. Tepper ◽  
...  

Purpose The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Cancer Research Committee designed a qualitative research project to assess the attitudes of cancer researchers and compliance officials regarding compliance with the US Privacy Rule and to identify potential strategies for eliminating perceived or real barriers to achieving compliance. Methods A team of three interviewers asked 27 individuals (13 investigators and 14 compliance officials) from 13 institutions to describe the anticipated approach of their institutions to Privacy Rule compliance in three hypothetical research studies. Results The interviews revealed that although researchers and compliance officials share the view that patients' cancer diagnoses should enjoy a high level of privacy protection, there are significant tensions between the two groups related to the proper standards for compliance necessary to protect patients. The disagreements are seen most clearly with regard to the appropriate definition of a “future research use” of protected health information in biospecimen and data repositories and the standards for a waiver of authorization for disclosure and use of such data. Conclusion ASCO believes that disagreements related to compliance and the resulting delays in certain projects and abandonment of others might be eased by additional institutional training programs and consultation on Privacy Rule issues during study design. ASCO also proposes the development of best practices documents to guide 1) creation of data repositories, 2) disclosure and use of data from such repositories, and 3) the design of survivorship and genetics studies.


2018 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 380-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rahim Hussain ◽  
Ahmed Shahriar Ferdous ◽  
Gillian Sullivan Mort

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine whether advertising type (static or dynamic) and appeal (emotional or rational) moderate the relationship between web banner advertising frequency and consumer attitudinal response. Design/methodology/approach A laboratory experiment involving 400 participants was conducted to test for the moderating effect. Factorial ANOVA is used to measure brand attitude. Findings The results identified that the web banner advertisement type acted as a moderator between frequency and brand attitude. However, the moderating effect of banner advertisement appeal was found to be insignificant at a single banner advertisement frequency (i.e. exposure) but significantly different at a higher frequency. The study findings provide better directives for online marketers. Practical implications The major limitation is the fact that the impact of banner advertisement frequency was manipulated from one to five exposures. Future research needs to determine what happens after the fifth exposure, perhaps ten exposures or more, to determine the wear-out effect and in turn, to decide on the optimal frequency level in an effort to design more appropriate web communication strategies. Social implications The result shows that pop-up banner advertisements are intrusive, and that high level of exposures to pop-up banner advertisement could annoy online users. Thus, online advertisers should avoid repeating the pop-up banner advertisements because this could adversely affect the attitude towards the online advertising in general, and could also negatively influence attitudes towards the brand and ultimately effect online purchase. Originality/value This study contributes to the theory by providing more insights into the repetition effect, and comprehensive conclusions can be drawn based on the manipulation of banner advertisement frequency on different frequency levels. The research identifies that if the communication objective is to generate brand attitude, different strategies can be adopted depending on the banner advertisement type (pop-up vs static) and banner advertisement appeal (emotional vs rational).


Author(s):  
Jianping Peng ◽  
Jing ("Jim") Quan ◽  
Guoying Zhang ◽  
Alan J. Dubinsky

This chapter combines three less-studied factors on employee knowledge sharing, namely, social relationship, contextual performance, and IT competence. Using a survey study that was targeted to professional employees in a R&D department, we reveal that both social relationship—which incorporates degree of centrality of employee's social network and frequency of interpersonal interaction—and employee's contextual performance have significant positive impacts on knowledge sharing. This association, however, is found to be further positively moderated by employee's IT competence. Our work extends the literature pertaining to knowledge sharing by, not only providing an enhanced approach to measure social relationship, but also emphasizing that social relationship or contextual performance can magnify the impact on knowledge sharing through a high level of IT competence. The findings provide managerial and future research insights pertaining to promoting knowledge sharing by enhancing social relationship, rewarding contextual performance, and improving IT competence of employees.


Author(s):  
Gitte Valentin ◽  
Lotte Groth Jensen

AbstractObjectivesThe aim of this overview was to systematically identify and synthesize existing evidence from systematic reviews on the impact of prehospital physician involvement.MethodsThe Medline, Embase, and Cochrane library were searched from 1 January 2000 to 17 November 2017. We included systematic reviews comparing physician-based with non–physician-based prehospital treatment in patients with one of five critical conditions requiring a rapid response.ResultsTen reviews published from 2009 to 2017 were included. Physician treatment was associated with increased survival in patients with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest and patients with severe trauma; in the latter group, the result was based on more limited evidence. The success rate of prehospital endotracheal intubation (ETI) has improved over the years, but ETI by physicians is still associated with higher success rates than intubation by paramedics. In patients with severe traumatic brain injury, intubation by paramedics who were not well skilled to do so markedly increased mortality.ConclusionsCurrent evidence is hinting at a benefit of physicians in selected aspects of prehospital emergency services, including treatment of patients with out-of-hospital cardiac arrest and critically ill or injured patients in need of prehospital intubation. Evidence is, however, limited by confounding and bias, and comparison is hampered by differences in case mix and the organization of emergency medical services. Future research should strive to design studies that enable appropriate control of baseline confounding and obtain follow-up data for the proportion of patients who die in the prehospital setting.


1994 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 34-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clifford Baker ◽  
Harvey Rude ◽  
Gary Sasso ◽  
Mel Weishahn

This study investigated the impact of two widely used commercial programs designed to increase peer understanding and acceptance of elementary school-aged handicapped students. Second, fourth, and sixth graders from six rural school districts were used in the study. The Better Understanding of Disabled Youth (BUDY) program and the Lets Meet the New Kids on the Block (KOB) program were two treatments employed to determine whether positive gains in attitudes toward the disabled could be systematically attained. Furthermore, the two programs were compared to see if one was more effective in this regard. By employing an adaptation of the Acceptance Scale (Voeltz, 1981) as both a pre-test and post-test measure, changes in student attitudes were documented on a variety of survey items. While a variety of variables were tracked, the most meaningful differences occurred between students in different grade levels. It appeared that second grade children increased their acceptance toward their peers with disabilities more positively as a result of undergoing the KOB interventions, while the older intermediate level children increased their acceptance more positively as a result of completing the BUDY interventions. Implications of findings and recommendations for future research are discussed.


2015 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 96-104 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan Miller Smedema ◽  
Joseph S. Pfaller ◽  
Rana A. Yaghmaian ◽  
Hayley Weaver ◽  
Elizabeth da Silva Cardoso ◽  
...  

Purpose: To examine the mediational effect of core self-evaluations (CSE) on the relationship between functional disability and life satisfaction.Methods: A quantitative descriptive design using multiple regression analysis. The participants were 97 college students with disabilities receiving services through Hunter College’s Minority-Disability Alliance (MIND Alliance) in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.Results: CSE was a partial mediator between functional disability and life satisfaction. After controlling for CSE, functional disability was no longer a significant predictor of life satisfaction.Conclusions: CSE partially mediated the impact of functional disability on life satisfaction. Future research should explore the development of interventions to increase CSE to reduce the effect of disability and to improve life satisfaction and employment outcomes for individuals with disabilities.


2005 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 64-73
Author(s):  
Andrew Simmons

Premedical students have often been viewed as academically narrow and cynical about liberal education. To investigate the veracity of this generalization, I conducted a qualitative study of pre-medical students at a liberal arts institution. Contrary to negative stereotypes, the students in the study expressed a positive attitude toward liberal education and articulated a belief that their own liberal education will benefit them as physicians. However, they acknowledged that obtaining high grades is also an important educational goal. Implications for advisors and medical admissions committees are discussed along with implications for future research.


Author(s):  
David F. Feldon ◽  
Soojeong Jeong ◽  
Joana Franco

Enhancing expertise in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) is vital to promoting both the intellectual and economic development of a modern society. This chapter synthesizes relevant studies on the acquisition and development of STEM expertise from different areas of research, including cognitive psychology, the psychology of science, sociology and anthropology, and educational research. Specifically, first, the structure of relevant STEM disciplines in conceptualizing the domain of expertise are discussed. Then the fundamental mechanisms of thinking and problem-solving practices in science and engineering that underlie expert performance within these disciplines are presented. Issues pertaining to assessment and recognition of expertise in STEM fields are also examined. Lastly, evidence pertaining to the impact of training and education on the development of STEM expertise is reviewed. The chapter closes with a critical analysis of STEM expertise research to date and identifies unanswered critical questions and new directions for future research.


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