Presentations: Session X

Multiple initiatives have arisen to address the disconnect between theory and practice in post-secondary STEM education. While these initiatives share a common mission of making STEM education more effective and inclusive, they have been working primarily in parallel toward that shared goal and lack unity. The NSITE network is a venue through which to build connections between prominent STEM education transformation organizations, starting in the life sciences. Our mission is to foster joint efforts to increase our understanding of the complex systems problem-space in which we operate, improve the efficacy of each organization's programs, and ultimately speed diffusion of evidence-based instructional practices. In this presentation, we will share successes, challenges, areas of joint effort and lessons learned in fostering network development.

NSITE began in 2019 with nine national STEM education transformation groups: BioQUEST, CC BioINSITES, CIRTL, NWBC, POD, POGIL, PULSE, NIST, and SENCER. All nine organizations have persisted through the first two years of network development. During that time, the network partners have taken part in two in-person meetings and many virtual meetings to build functional relationships, share successful strategies, and identify areas of common challenge toward which they can work collaboratively. These organizations offer a breadth of programming available to both individuals and institutions looking for training, guidance, resources, and support while attempting transformation. Most of the organizations' programming is open to educators from any post-secondary institution type. While there is variation in their mechanisms for fomenting change, the most common areas of emphasis are pedagogy, course content/curriculum and faculty development offered in the form of workshops. Currently, two sub-groups within the network are jointly working on strategies to a) increase participation in professional development by historically excluded groups and b) better support efforts by alumni to transform their classrooms following participation in professional development programs.  

 The TRESTLE (Transforming Education, Stimulating Teaching & Learning Excellence) initiative was developed as a multi-institutional intervention across six universities to promote broad adoption of evidence-based and inclusive teaching practices in undergraduate education. TRESTLE was an extension of the successful Science Education Initiative (SEI; Wieman, 2017), in which of discipline-based educational specialists (DBESs) are embedded within departments as catalysts of change, collaborating with faculty on student-centered course transformation. In TRESTLE we sought to implement and study an adaptation of the SEI model designed to be more financially feasible and generalizable to more institutions, while building on insights from that substantial effort. To promote meaningful change through a smaller investment in embedded expertise (fewer experts per department), we looked to the change literature to inform the design of additional intervention components. Those additional components included: building intellectual communities that amplify the effects of the embedded experts; and making evidence of the impact of course transformations visible within the communities, to influence social norms and propel further change. Each partner university implemented a model variation adapted to their institutional context, and we used a combination of quantitative and case study evaluation methods to determine the success of the overall model and its localized adaptations.

In this session, we will describe how we used research and theory on change to design the intervention model and its local variations, and to guide our ongoing refinements of the interventions in response to challenges that emerged over time. We will also share results from our ongoing assessments of the impact and sustainability of our interventions, and what they can tell us about change theories. Additional discussion will center on generalizable principles for translating ideas from the change literature into practical implementation, as well as how to contextualize those practices to align with local institutional cultures.

Because of their unique role at the intersection of teacher education, engagement, and scholarship, STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education centers are a vital part of institutional change related to equity and broadening participation. But their role is much more than simply increasing rates of participation. Instead, STEM education centers must challenge entrenched perceptions of the STEM disciplines, recreate programming to be more inclusive, and promote cultural change that expands access to and success in STEM. In this presentation, we explore a number of tensions that exist in STEM education, both formal and informal, and consider how tensions can become transformations. We raise questions that can be used to guide strategic planning for STEM centers, providing systemic processes through which change can be sustained and into which accountability can be integrated across stake holders.