scholarly journals Creating Support Systems for Black Women in Nontraditional STEM Career Paths

2019 ◽  
pp. 108-142
Author(s):  
Tokiwa T. Smith ◽  
Natasha N. Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
Career Paths ◽  
Support Systems ◽  
Women In Stem ◽  
Stem Fields ◽  
Specific Career ◽  
Stem Career ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
K 12 ◽  
Educational Journeys

Although careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields are widely acknowledged as central to the future, women remain largely underrepresented in these spheres. This is particularly true for Black women, highlighting the necessity of support systems and resources designed to promote their success in STEM. Ideally, these supports should begin during the K-12 years and continue throughout the course of their educational journeys. Current research indicates that Black women in STEM achieve greater, lasting success when they have access to structured support systems. As the career paths of Black women in STEM continue to evolve, there remains a need for adaptable structures and resources that are applicable to their unique needs. Yet, these supports often do not exist for those pursuing nontraditional STEM career paths. Therefore, this chapter underscores the need for Black women in STEM to establish their own support systems, aligned with their specific career paths.

“I wanted to follow in her footsteps”: Activating, Nurturing, and Extending Community Cultural Wealth for Students of Color Entering STEM Pathways

2020 ◽  
Vol 122 (9) ◽  
pp. 1-36
Author(s):  
Blanca Rincón ◽  
Érica Fernández ◽  
Juanita K. Hinojosa
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Research Design ◽  
Students Of Color ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Community Cultural Wealth ◽  
Stem Fields ◽  
Cultural Wealth ◽  
Stem Major ◽  
Stem Career ◽  
K 12

Background/Context Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) occupations account for the second-fastest growing sector in the United States. As racial and ethnic “minorities” become the college-age majority, there is a need to facilitate access and success for Students of Color in STEM fields. Purpose The present study seeks to investigate the ways in which important others shape the initial educational and career aspirations of Students of Color pursuing STEM pathways. Research Design This study draws on a mixed-methods research design using both survey and interview data to investigate similar and different facets of the college and career decision-making processes for Students of Color in STEM fields. Results Findings from this study suggest that as Students of Color narrow their decisions to attend college, select a STEM major, and pursue a STEM career, the network of people who influence these decisions widens beyond parents and family members to include K-12 teachers and other institutional agents. This network, then, activates, nurtures, and/or extends the community cultural wealth for Students of Color entering STEM pathways. Conclusion/Recommendations Our findings suggest that at every decision-making point (e.g., going to college, selecting a STEM major, and pursuing a STEM career), family members (e.g., parents, siblings, and extended family) directly or indirectly shaped the STEM pathways of Students of Color. As such, we argue that families cannot be ignored in the pursuit toward diversifying the STEM workforce.

scholarly journals ‘It Is Time to Operate Like a Woman’: A Corpus Based Study of Representation of Women in STEM Fields in Social Media

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 217
Author(s):  
Reem Alkhammash
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Gender Stereotypes ◽  
Women In Science ◽  
Women In Stem ◽  
Stem Fields ◽  
Representation Of Women ◽  
Gender Biases ◽  
Twitter Users ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
And Function

This study explores the discourse of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics or medicine (STEM) fields produced by Twitter users on social media, with a particular focus on language usage and function in this discourse. The exploration of the women in STEM discourse was achieved by collecting a body of tweets using popular hashtags addressing women in STEM from the last week of October 2017. Following a corpus-based approach, this study analyzes the most frequent evaluative adjectives and 4-grams. Results from the analysis of evaluative adjectives show that Twitter users represent women in STEM fields positively by using positive adjectives such as great, amazing, inspirational etc. Furthermore, the analysis of the most frequent 4-grams reveals that Twitter users employ hashtags such as #ilooklikeasurgeon and #womeninSTEM to promote the work of women in STEM fields, show their appreciation of women working and studying in STEM and challenge prevalent gender stereotypes of STEM professions. It was found that the production of women in STEM discourse by most Twitter users has contributed to increasing the strength of women in the STEM community in social media, evidenced by their practices of advocacy, networking and challenging gender biases online. The discourse of women in STEM in social media is an example of discursive activism that focuses on the larger dialogue of women in STEM and highlights dominant forms of sexism and gendered stereotypes of women’s work in male dominated professions.

Crowd-Funding for Inspiring Graduate Students to Educate K12 Students About STEM

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine Taylor ◽  
Suresh K. Sitaraman
Keyword(s):  
Graduate Students ◽  
Electronic Packaging ◽  
Teachable Moment ◽  
Teachable Moments ◽  
Georgia Institute ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
Stem Career ◽  
Institute Of Technology ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
K 12

Often when people who are not in the field hear about electronic packaging, they immediately presume that it is exclusive to electrical engineering; however, electronic packaging has opportunities for many different Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) areas. Many projects in micro- and nanotechnology are interdisciplinary in nature, and thus, a broad background of various disciplines is needed to conduct research and development in these areas. At the Georgia Institute of Technology, an initiative called the Meindl Legacy project has been created to use crowd funding to help graduate students in the nanotechnology area to create “teachable moments.” The intention of the teachable moment is to broaden the research to younger audiences, so that they are inspired to take the necessary background classes needed to pursue a STEM career path. The use of crowd-funding allows for industry partners and the general public to become involved with research that is currently ongoing at the Georgia Institute of Technology and to educate K-12 students. The “teachable moment” outlined in this paper was created to demonstrate how different materials’ coefficients of thermal expansion can affect the interfaces and potentially lead to cracking damage in an electronic package.

scholarly journals Inside the STEM pipeline: Changes in students’ biomedical career plans across the college years

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (18) ◽  
pp. eabe0985
Author(s):  
Emily Q. Rosenzweig ◽  
Cameron A. Hecht ◽  
Stacy J. Priniski ◽  
Elizabeth A. Canning ◽  
Michael W. Asher ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Graduate Education ◽  
Career Paths ◽  
College Graduation ◽  
Stem Fields ◽  
Career Plans ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
Stem Pipeline ◽  
Interview Survey ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
Biomedical Fields

Researchers often invoke the metaphor of a pipeline when studying participation in careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), focusing on the important issue of students who “leak” from the pipeline, but largely ignoring students who persist in STEM. Using interview, survey, and institutional data over 6 years, we examined the experiences of 921 students who persisted in biomedical fields through college graduation and planned to pursue biomedical careers. Despite remaining in the biomedical pipeline, almost half of these students changed their career plans, which was almost twice the number of students who abandoned biomedical career paths altogether. Women changed plans more often and were more likely than men to change to a career requiring fewer years of post-graduate education. Results highlight the importance of studying within-pipeline patterns rather than focusing only on why students leave STEM fields.

Boosting the Sustainable Representation of Women in STEM With Evidence-Based Policy Initiatives

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 50-58
Author(s):  
Corinne A. Moss-Racusin ◽  
Evava S. Pietri ◽  
Jojanneke van der Toorn ◽  
Leslie Ashburn-Nardo
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Women In Stem ◽  
Stem Fields ◽  
Policy Initiatives ◽  
Representation Of Women ◽  
Specific Policy ◽  
National Competitiveness ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
And Mathematics

Women are missing from Science, Technology, Education, and Mathematics (STEM) fields, undermining intellectual inclusivity, meritocracy goals, national competitiveness, and high-quality advances. Solutions require not only hiring more women, but boosting their sustainable representation (i.e., their lasting, substantial presence and valued engagement). Evidence-based policies can shift organizational culture, enabling women’s full and durable participation. The present review presents (1) numerous causes of women’s underrepresentation in STEM and (2) evidence-based interventions to tackling these causes. Specific policy initiatives (derived from the scientific evidence) would promote the sustainable representation of women in STEM.

Navigating the Gendered Math Path

2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-174
Author(s):  
Christina D. Weber ◽  
Angie Hodge
Keyword(s):  
Gender Norms ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Doing Gender ◽  
Women In Stem ◽  
Stem Fields ◽  
Self Perception ◽  
Good Science ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Male Dominated ◽  
Mathematics Coursework

Using dialogues with our informants, as well as with each other, we explore how the men and women in our research make it through their mathematics coursework and, in turn, pursue their intended majors. Our research focuses on how students navigate what we call the gendered math path and how that path conforms to and diverges from traditional gender norms. Common themes of women's lower than men's self-perception of their ability to do mathematics, along with the divergent processes of doing gender that emerged in men's and women's discussions of their application of mathematics, reminded us of the continued struggles that women have to succeed in male-dominated academic disciplines. Although self-perception helps us understand why there are fewer women in STEM fields, it is important to understand how different forms of application of ideas might add to the diversity of what it means to do good science.

scholarly journals Gender Differences in Academic Efficacy across STEM Fields

2021 ◽  
pp. 073112142110286
Author(s):  
Jennifer Ashlock ◽  
Miodrag Stojnic ◽  
Zeynep Tufekci
Keyword(s):  
Gender Differences ◽  
Gender Gap ◽  
Meaning Making ◽  
Stem Fields ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Science Technology ◽  
Middle Schoolers ◽  
Self Assessments ◽  
Math Grades ◽  
And Mathematics

Cultural processes can reduce self-selection into math and science fields, but it remains unclear how confidence in computer science develops, where women are currently the least represented in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). Few studies evaluate both computer skills and self-assessments of skill. In this paper, we evaluate gender differences in efficacy across three STEM fields using a data set of middle schoolers, a particularly consequential period for academic pathways. Even though girls and boys do not significantly differ in terms of math grades and have similar levels of computer skill, the gender gap in computer efficacy is twice as large as the gap for math. We offer support for disaggregation of STEM fields, so the unique meaning making around computing can be addressed.

scholarly journals Integrated STEM for Teacher Professional Learning and Development: “I Need Time for Practice”

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 21
Author(s):  
Andrea C. Burrows ◽  
Mike Borowczak ◽  
Adam Myers ◽  
Andria C. Schwortz ◽  
Courtney McKim
Keyword(s):  
Professional Learning ◽  
Social Constructionism ◽  
Teacher Professional Learning ◽  
Authentic Science ◽  
Learning And Development ◽  
Integrated Stem ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Teacher Professional ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
K 12

This study compares three pre-collegiate teacher professional learning and development (PLD) integrated science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) experiences framed in astronomy. The study is set in the western United States (USA) and involves 60 pre-collegiate teachers (in the USA these are K-12 teachers) over the course of three years (June 2014–May 2017). During the PLDs, astronomy acted as a vehicle for pre-collegiate STEM teachers to increase their STEM content knowledge as well as create and implement integrated STEM classroom lessons. The authors collected quantitative and qualitative data to address five research questions and embraced social constructionism as the theoretical framework. Findings show that STEM pre-collegiate teachers are largely engaged with integrated STEM PLD content and embrace astronomy content and authentic science. Importantly, they need time to practice, interpret, translate, and use the integrated STEM content in classroom lessons. Recommendations for PLD STEM teacher support are provided. Implications of this study are vast, as gaps in authentic science, utilizing astronomy, PLD structure, and STEM integration are ripe for exploration.

scholarly journals “Looking at Myself in the Future”: how mentoring shapes scientific identity for STEM students from underrepresented groups

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kaitlyn Atkins ◽  
Bryan M. Dougan ◽  
Michelle S. Dromgold-Sermen ◽  
Hannah Potter ◽  
Viji Sathy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Career Pathways ◽  
Underrepresented Minority ◽  
Stem Fields ◽  
Underrepresented Minority Students ◽  
Research Mentorship ◽  
Demographic Similarity ◽  
Stem Students ◽  
And Mathematics ◽  
Scientific Identity ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract Background Mentorship has been well-established in the literature as fostering scientific identity and career pathways for underrepresented minority students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. Mentorship is prioritized by programs that aim to increase diversity and support future leadership in STEM fields, but in-depth understanding of mentorship in these contexts remains limited. Drawing on qualitative interview data, we sought to understand the relationship between mentoring and scientific identity among a diverse sample of 24 students in one such program, in order to inform program development. Results Qualitative analysis of the data revealed that mentorship, especially research mentorship, was common and played a role in formation of scientific identity. Students with research mentors tended to say they strongly identified as scientists, whereas those who lacked research mentorship varied in their level of scientific identity. In interviews, research-mentored students described mentors as colleagues who gave them opportunities to grow and as examples to look up to. Students valued mentors with whom they identified on the basis of demographic similarity or shared values, as well as those who challenged them in their academic and research endeavors. Conclusions Our analysis highlights how different mentoring experiences can contribute to development of future STEM leadership. We discuss implications for practice, including the need for tailored mentoring approaches and research-focused mentoring, and offer several recommendations for research and programming.

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