MSP News: Underrepresentation in STEM
March 25, 2010
NEWS IN BRIEF
1. NEW IN LIBRARY
A. "Why So Few? Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics," Catherine Hill, Christianne Corbett, Andresse St. Rose, American Association of University Women, March 2010.
B. "Bayer Facts of Science Education XIV: Female and Minority Chemists and Chemical Engineers Speak about Diversity and Underrepresentation in STEM," Bayer Corporation, March 2010.
C. "Raising Their Voices: Engaging Students, Teachers, and Parents to Help End the High School Dropout Epidemic," John M. Bridgeland, et al., in association with Peter D. Hart Research Associates, for the AT&T Foundation and the America's Promise Alliance, March 2010.
D. "Building a Learning Agenda Around Disconnected Youth," a report by MDRC, commissioned by the Gates Foundation, March 2010.
2. ANNOUNCEMENT
Boston Science Partnership Showcase 2010: A New Vision of Urban Science Education
April 12th & 13th, 2010 in Boston, MA
You are invited to attend a special two-day event highlighting the Boston Science Partnership's achievements in its primary five years of NSF MSP funding.
DETAILS BELOW
1. NEW IN LIBRARY
A. "Why So Few? Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics," Catherine Hill, Christianne Corbett, Andresse St. Rose, American Association of University Women, March 2010.
"In an era when women are increasingly prominent in medicine, law and business, why are there so few women scientists and engineers? A new research report by AAUW presents compelling evidence that can help to explain this puzzle. Why So Few? Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics presents in-depth yet accessible profiles of eight key research findings that point to environmental and social barriers - including stereotypes, gender bias and the climate of science and engineering departments in colleges and universities - that continue to block women's participation and progress in science, technology, engineering, and math. The report also includes up to date statistics on girls' and women's achievement and participation in these areas and offers new ideas for what each of us can do to more fully open scientific and engineering fields to girls and women."
MSPnet Location: LIBRARY>>Ed Change & Policy
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20591
B. "Bayer Facts of Science Education XIV: Female and Minority Chemists and Chemical Engineers Speak about Diversity and Underrepresentation in STEM," Bayer Corporation, March 2010.
"With this survey, Bayer's goal is to add a critical voice to the national diversity/underrepresentation discussion - that of the female and minority STEM professionals themselves. Not only to continue the national conversation about these issues, but to uncover the root causes of underrepresentation and the key factors - both positive and negative, similar and disparate - that female and minority scientists encounter as they move along the U.S. STEM education pipeline and into the workplace."
MSPnet Location: LIBRARY>>Ed Change & Policy
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20590
C. "Raising Their Voices: Engaging Students, Teachers, and Parents to Help End the High School Dropout Epidemic," John M. Bridgeland, et al., in association with Peter D. Hart Research Associates, for the AT&T Foundation and the America's Promise Alliance, March 2010.
"A new report, the fourth in a series, unites different perspectives to examine the causes of the nation's dropout problem. The survey, by the Washington-based public-policy group Civic Enterprises, builds on previous reports that separately chronicled the perspectives of students, parents, and teachers by bringing all three groups together in discussions held at schools in Baltimore, Dallas, Indianapolis, and Kingston, Tenn.
By uniting those viewpoints, the new report attempts to demonstrate that there is significant agreement about the barriers that hinder students from progressing into college or careers. Students at times fail to see how coursework is relevant to their future, the report says, and teachers are often unable to reinforce that relevance because of large class sizes, a lack of school support, and the pressure of standardized testing. Likewise, parents may be impeded from giving positive academic reinforcement by multiple jobs and single parenthood. The report contends that to succeed in lowering the dropout rate, any reforms must be coupled with personal responsibility and cooperation among different groups involved."
MSPnet Location: LIBRARY>>Ed Change & Policy
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20588
D. "Building a Learning Agenda Around Disconnected Youth," a report by MDRC, commissioned by the Gates Foundation, March 2010.
"In December 2007, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation gave MDRC a grant to conduct reconnaissance on promising strategies to reengage disconnected young people and improve their long-term outcomes. The primary objective of the grant was to identify key leverage points for future investment by government and foundations. MDRC consulted with researchers and policy experts, reviewed the results of completed and ongoing evaluations of youth programs, visited a number of innovative youth programs and cities with strong youth strategies, and hosted a meeting of youth practitioners.
The goal of the paper's recommendations is to develop a menu of approaches for the heterogeneous population of disconnected youth -- analogous in some ways to the multiple pathways that are being developed for high school students. The recommendations fall into two broad categories: building knowledge about mature, existing programs (to better understand whether they work, for whom, and why) and investment in developing and/or scaling up new programs that address areas of unmet need, such as efforts to restructure General Educational Development (GED) preparation programs so that they are more tightly linked with postsecondary programs, both occupational and academic; new "leg-up" strategies for older youth with very low basic skill levels, for whom a GED may not be a realistic goal; and new strategies to engage young people who are more profoundly disconnected and unlikely to volunteer for youth programs."
MSPnet Location: LIBRARY>>Ed Change & Policy
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20589
2. ANNOUNCEMENT
Boston Science Partnership Showcase 2010: A New Vision of Urban Science Education
April 12th & 13th, 2010 in Boston, MA
You are invited to attend the Boston Science Partnership's Showcase and MSP Working Session. This special two-day event will highlight evidence of outcomes that the Boston Science Partnership (BSP) has achieved in its primary five years of NSF MSP funding. We invite your Partnerships and your colleagues to join us for either or both of the days as we share results, celebrate successes, and use the BSP as a case study of a successful project.
The framing questions for the conference are: What has the Boston Science Partnership meant to Boston? and What can others learn from the Boston science story?
April 12 - BSP Showcase: The Showcase will be a daylong seminar in which we report on the findings from the project, relate quantitative and qualitative results about science achievement and professional development, and bring a wide variety of Boston science stakeholders together to understand the past and envision the future. Registration for the Showcase can be found on our website (www.bostonscience.org).
April 13 - MSP Working Session: The MSP Working Session will provide an opportunity for those interested in learning from and replicating aspects of the BSP to learn more about how our Partnership has accomplished its goals, and to explore the BSP's strategies and emerging models in more depth. The BSP will serve as a case study of a mature project in Year 6 of its funding. Empirical evidence will be a component of each topic throughout the day. Principal Investigators from other projects will provide additional examples from their contexts to complement the specifics from Boston.
The primary target audiences for the MSP Working Session on April 13th are NSF-funded MSP projects, state MSP projects, and MSP-Start teams in the proposal development stages. There are a limited number of travel stipends for NSF projects only. Please see website for more information.
MSPnet Location: SHOWCASE>>Highlights
http://hub.mspnet.org/entry.cfm/20581