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We detail our experience running an annual four-day workshop at the University of Minnesota, called the Mathematics Project at Minnesota (MPM). The workshop is for undergraduates who come from groups underrepresented in mathematics and aims to increase the participation and success of such groups in the mathematics major at the University. In this paper, we explain how MPM is organized, discuss its objectives, and highlight some of the sessions that we feel are emblematic of the program's success. The paper concludes with an analysis of achievements and obstacles in the programs' first three years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on data from the National Science Foundation (NSF) ADVANCE-funded LATTICE program (Launching Academics on the Tenure-Track: an Intentional Community in Engineering) to examine how a diverse group of women worked across social and professional identities to support early-career women in academic engineering. We used ethnography to elucidate the social dynamics and power relations involved in forming a coherent group identity for the LATTICE leadership team, and the boundaries we negotiated in running the LATTICE program. We identify the processes and behaviors through which we made boundaries between members salient yet porous to build a coherent community across various dimensions of difference. We offer three actionable strategies that impact change agents' engagement and the group's coherence across multiple dimensions of difference: (1) intentionally creating a socio-emotional culture in our group, one that spans across group members' personal and professional identities; (2) validating other group members' perspectives, and (3) striving to build consensus using storytelling. These strategies of the LATTICE leadership team provide guidelines for others who work across intersecting dimensions of difference. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Culturally responsive computing (CRC) frames the localized knowledges and practices of Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities as assets for working toward racial justice in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). A key part of CRC is the role that local communities play in designing and/or implementing curricula and technologies. Yet, there is a dearth of research on collaborating with local knowledge experts and what they think about CRC. In response, this paper details a two-year long research project on the design and implementation of one CRC program called pH Empowered. pH Empowered uses computing to bridge Black hairstyling, chemistry, and entrepreneurship. Through a mixed-methods study of one pH Empowered professional development workshop, we show how cosmetologists, urban farmers, and librarians had diverse perspectives about how to be culturally responsive with STEM and the racial justice goal of broadening participation in STEM education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As new efforts seek to expand computer science education across the globe, there has been a widespread effort to prepare school teachers for teaching computer science to culturally and racially diverse students. This effort to center diversity and equity is notable as computer science courses are typically homogenous in terms of race and gender, making the need to center diversity in teacher education spaces. This paper reports on an ethnographic study in the United States that describes how teachers dialogue around issues of race and computer science education in a residential week-long professional development workshop. Drawing from the dialogue of a geographically, racially, and culturally diverse group of teachers, this article describes how teachers evade, deflect, center, and reflect on racially explicit discourse around teaching computer science. Grounded in vignettes from two teacher classrooms, this research study considers how culturally responsive computing and critical race theory can illuminate the ways in which teachers discuss race and culture in computer science professional learning environments. The study's findings demonstrate features of long-term professional preparation that can surface colorblind ideologies and help teachers move toward a culturally responsive pedagogy to teaching computer science. Abbreviations: CS - computer science ; PD - professional development ; CRT - critical race theory [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Context: Non-traditional training grounds such as coding boot camps that attract a higher proportion of women are important sites for understanding how to broaden participation in computing. Objective: This work aims to help us better understand the women choosing boot camps and their pathways through these camps and into the computing workforce. Method: This paper reports on a longitudinal, qualitative study investigating female boot camp attendees. Findings: Findings show that women attending boot camps are career changers that develop an interest in software development too late to major in CS, discovering a post-college enjoyment of programming undertaken to support work goals at a current job or an aspirational job. Implications: Women at boot camps illustrate a missed opportunity to diversify postsecondary CS classrooms when not recruited early, not given interdisciplinary options, not exposed to enjoyable programming tasks, and not exposed to the array and number of job prospects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we provide a detailed account of how to implement a peer role model (PRM) program similar to the one that we developed at San Diego State University (SDSU) to broaden participation of college women in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). In particular, we summarize our findings of the PRM program's best practices, explaining how we recruit, select, and train PRMs, and giving a protocol for successful presentation and implementation of the program. We begin with some background information so that readers understand the rationale for developing the PRM program. We then offer a step-by-step guide to building a PRM program, so that educators and practitioners have a clear guide to follow when implementing their own PRM program. Our PRM program was facilitated by a grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF DRL 1535117) and the strong support from the mathematics department at SDSU. We recognize that not everyone interested in implementing their own PRM program has access to the same resources and that institutions may differ in the structure of their calculus sequence; hence, in the discussion section we provide some suggestions for how the PRM program's methodology might be adapted and scaled to other institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ongoing efforts to broaden the participation of women and people of colour in engineering degree programmes and careers have had limited success. This paper describes a different approach to broadening participation that seeks to work with all students and develop inclusive engineering identities. Researchers worked with the instructors of two first-year engineering courses to integrate curriculum activities designed to promote the formation of engineering identities and build an appreciation for how diversity and inclusion strengthen engineering practice. Multilevel modelling results indicated positive effects of the intervention on appreciation for diversity but no effects on engineering identity, and qualitative results indicated students learned the most about diversity not through one of the intervention activities, but through team projects in the courses. We also describe lessons learned in how to teach engineering students about diversity in ways that are relevant to engineering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Makingis a rapidly emerging form of educational practice that involves the design, construction, testing, and revision of a wide variety of objects, using high and low technologies, and integrating a range of disciplines including art, science, engineering, and mathematics. It has garnered widespread interest and support in both policy and education circles because of the ways it has been shown to link science learning to creativity and investigation. Making has taken root in out-of-school settings, such as museums, science festivals, and afterschool and library programmes; and there is now growing interest from primary and secondary educators in how it might be incorporated into the classroom. Making expands on traditions associated with Technology Education and Design-Based Learning, but differs in ways that can potentially broaden participation in science and STEM learning to include learners from communities historically underrepresented in STEM fields. STEM-Rich Making is centrally organised around design and engineering practices, typically integrating digital tools and computational practices, and positions scientific and mathematical concepts and phenomena as the materials for design. This paper takes a critical view of the claims about Making as a productive form of science teaching and learning, and reviews the current research literature’s substantiation of the ways in which Making supports students’ agency, promotes active participation in science and engineering practices, and leverages learners’ cultural resources. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

To date, there has been a wealth of research on participation in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields, but most research focuses on the implementation of programs and whether these programs work. Such research can be expanded and enhanced by considering geographic perspectives on participation in the STEM fields and by examining the factors that prevent participation in these fields. In this paper, we seek to examine geographic perspectives to broadening participation in the STEM fields in two ways. We first conduct a literature review on the geographical understanding of barriers and facilitators of higher education that encompasses underrepresented populations in STEM fields. Second, we present a case study that catalyzes geography and seeks to broaden participation in the STEM fields. Both the literature review and case study show the significance and the role played by place-based factors and approaches, spatial thinking and inquiry-based learning, and environmental education and civic engagement work in helping advance the science of broadening participation in STEM fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]