Presentations: Session XII

In this presentation, we will report on emergent findings from Leveraging the AAU STEM Education Initiative, a study aimed at examining the institutional landscape in which innovations to undergraduate STEM education take place. This research project builds on the work of the AAU Undergraduate STEM Education Initiative. It grew out of an awareness that multiple efforts to improve undergraduate STEM education are underway on AAU campuses. What was less understood was the institutional context that influences these approaches.

Our study examined the specific approaches that individual campuses are putting in place to advance and coordinate multiple undergraduate STEM education reforms. We wanted to better understand the benefits and limitations of these approaches, and what factors influenced the implementation, institutionalization, and coordination of multiple reform efforts within a single campus to achieve sustainable change in undergraduate STEM teaching and learning.

Over a two-year period, we conducted multiple site visits at eight AAU universities, interviewing 395 individuals. We will share our emergent findings on (1) the contextual elements that shape success (or lack thereof) in achieving long-lasting improvements in STEM undergraduate education, (2) what enables or impedes the advancement and coordination of multiple undergraduate STEM education reforms on a campus, and (3) why the interactions between the department context and institutional factors are so critical to the future of successful educational reform.

This project joins the AAU Undergraduate STEM Education Initiative's earlier research and applications to practice that identified a Framework for Systemic Change in STEM Undergraduate Teaching and Learning, Essential Questions and Data Sources for Continuous Improvement of Undergraduate STEM Teaching and Learning, and AAU's five-year status report, Progress Toward Achieving Systemic Change. These resources provide a conceptual framework, key questions, and cross-cutting strategies that institutions are engaging with and implementing to achieve systemic improvements in undergraduate STEM education.  

Recognizing that the systemic transformation of STEM higher education is challenging, the (STEM)2 Network directly addresses those challenges by bridging disciplinary and institutional silos, and leveraging the reward structure of the current system to support faculty as they work to transform this very system. In this presentation, we will describe a model that attendees can adopt and customize to leverage multidisciplinary and multi-institution collaborations that catalyze STEM transformation. The Sustainable, Transformative Engagement across a Multi-Institution/ Multidisciplinary STEM, (STEM)2, "STEM-squared", Network is empowering faculty to transform the system from inside the system. The Network is founded upon three theoretical frameworks: Communities of Transformation, systems design for organizational change, and emergent outcomes for diffusion of innovations in STEM education. Currently composed of five institutions—three private four-year universities and two public community colleges—the Network capitalizes on the close geographic proximity and shared student demographics to effect change across classroom, disciplinary, institutional, and inter-institutional levels. Since its establishment in January 2020, the Network has (1) increased the number of collaborations across disciplines and institutions, (2) increased the extent to which faculty feel empowered to be change agents for STEM transformation, (3) published two manuscripts, (4) evolved to include ideas that emerged from participants, and (5) developed multiple on-going projects.  

Our interactive presentation describes a project based on the premise that evidence-based instructional practices alone are not sufficient for addressing inequities that result in students succeeding in, or leaving postsecondary STEM. We realized that additional practices and an instructor's stance toward social justice are necessary to create a stronger sense of belonging and fewer instances of exclusion in STEM. We identified curriculum design, teaching practices and making social justice explicit as strategies that increase students' sense of belonging, success, and persistence in STEM. This work is part of HHMI's Inclusive Excellence initiative.

We identified mechanisms for first- and second-order change. First-order change included (1) targeting 5 cohorts of about 20 instructors of science from our university and two nearby community colleges ("Fellows"); (2) crafting an initial workshop (one week in-person in year 1, and 24 hours online in year 2); and (3) designing cohort-based support and community-building activities that help our Fellows implement / experiment with their designed action plans. The action plans are how Fellows translate workshop-based learnings into instructional practice.

Second-order change is based on three elements: (1) an evolving community of Fellows experienced and successful in this work, using measures of student belonging for ongoing improvement, as well as training to become advocates and change agents in spheres of influence; (2) early embedding of the project into the Office of Undergraduate Education and the Center for Teaching and Learning at OSU; and (3) close collaboration and acknowledgement of other existing structures, institutions and people at OSU, who work towards similar goals of social justice, equity and student belonging and success.

Post-workshop data on the second cohort of fellows illustrates some of the challenges facing the team, and some of future opportunities. Reflections of progress towards structural embeddedness in university and community college contexts will complement the talk.