A theoretically based STEM talent development program that bridges excellence gaps

Abstract

The pipeline of highly trained STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) professionals has narrowed in recent decades, forcing society to re-examine how schools are discovering and developing STEM talent. Of particular concern is the finding that rural students attend post-secondary schools at lower rates than their urban counterparts, and when they do attend, they are less likely to graduate from STEM programs. One reason may be that they are not prepared for advanced STEM coursework because they lack access to essential STEM talent-development programs in middle or high school. This creates excellence gaps, which exacerbate the narrowing STEM pipeline to the workforce. To address this, we formed a university-school partnership to develop an outside-of-school STEM talent development program, called STEM Excellence, for rural middle-school students who attend under-resourced schools.The aim of STEM Excellence was to increase students' achievement and aspirations while empowering their teachers to develop local STEM programs grounded in developmental psychology theories. STEM Excellence integrated the Talent Development Megamodel Principles of ability, domains of talent, opportunity, and psychosocial variables. STEM Excellence also recognized the interplay of multiple person-environment systems as presented in the Bioecological Systems Model.

Attracting and developing STEMM talent toward excellence and innovation

“…5,8,14 Such support measures, in turn, increase self-efficacy and outcome expectations in STEMM and long-term career aspirations for STEMM. 14,15 However, not all groups of learners have comparable access to such learning opportunities, 16,17 which means not all talents receive appropriate support, and some are thus lost from the STEMM talent development pipeline at a very early stage. For example, students from families with higher levels of education and socioeconomic status (SES) predominate in school and out-of-school STEMM programs.…”

Talent denied: Equity and excellence gaps in STEMM

“…They encompass all manner of gaps in all STEMM fields across age groups, educational levels, and scale levels. The following list illustrates the prevalence, extreme diversity, and complexity of the subject: Kinds of gaps: excellence gap, 16,17 pay gap, 18,19 achievement gap, 20 confidence gap, 21,22 opportunity gap, 23,24 representation gap 25 STEMM‐fields: astronomy, 26,27 biology, 28,29 chemistry, 30,31 engineering, 32,33 geosciences, 34,35 computer science, 36 math, 37,38 medicine, 39,40 pharmacy, 41,42 physics 43,44 Age groups: early childhood, 45 childhood, 46,47 youth and adolescence, 48,49 adulthood 50,51 Educational levels: kindergarten, 52,53 elementary education, 23,54 secondary education, 55,56 higher education, 57,58 vocational education 59,60 Kinds of groups: ethnicity, 48,61 gender and sex, 62,63 immigrants, 64,65 migrants, 66,67 generational, 68,69 sexual orientation and gender identity, 70,71 countries, 72,73 special educational needs and disabilities, 45,71 twice exceptional 74 Scale levels: geography, 75,76 culture, 77,78 institutions and organizations, 79,80 schools, 56,81 groups, 61,82 family 83,84 …”