Getting Everyone to the Fair: Supporting Teachers in Broadening Participation in Science and Engineering Fairs

Lakin, Joni M.; Ewald, Mary Lou; Hardy, Emily; Cobine, Paul A.; Marino, Janie G.; Landers, A. L.; Davis, Virginia A.

doi:10.1007/s10956-021-09910-7

Cited by 7 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 49 publications

(75 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…For competitive SEF, our findings support the idea that the best way to increase success of all high school students would be by developing programs that result in more help for the students from scientists or student scientists. Some innovative programs along these lines recently have been initiated [ 16 – 18 , 39 ].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recently, innovative high school programs have been described that combine student participation in SEF with student and teacher curricular support to promote STEM engagement and learning, especially focused on students from under-represented ethnic minorities and low socioeconomic backgrounds [ 16 – 18 ]. Such programs are particularly important given low levels of Black, Hispanic, and some other ethnic minority individuals in STEM fields compared with their proportion in the population.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

High school science fair: Ethnicity trends in student participation and experience

2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In this paper, we report ethnicity trends in student participation and experience in high school science and engineering fair (SEFs). SEF participation showed significant ethnic diversity. For survey students, the approximate distribution was Asian-32%; Black-11%; Hispanic-20%; White-33%; Other-3%. Comparing the SEF level at which students competed from school to district to region to state levels, we observed that black students made up only 4.5% of the students who participated in SEF beyond the school level, whereas students from other ethnic groups were more equally represented at all levels. The lower percentage of Black students resulted from a combination of lower overall participation in SEF and lower percentage of those students who did participate to advance to SEFs beyond the school level. Students who advanced to SEFs beyond the school level frequently received help from scientists, coaching for the interview, and were not required to participate in SEF. Black students received the least help from scientists, were least likely to receive coaching for the interview, and were most likely to be required to participate in SEF. They also were most likely to receive no help from parents, teachers, or scientists. Asian and Hispanic students (63.8% and 56.8%) indicated a greater interest in careers in science and engineering (S&E) compared to Black and White students (43.7% & 50.7%). In addition to career interest, the most important experiences that correlated with students who indicated that SEF increased their interests in S&E were getting help from the internet, books and magazines; getting help fine tuning the report; and overcoming obstacles by doing more background research, making a timeline, and perseverance. Black students did not report a positive effect of any of these strategies but experienced time pressure as more of an obstacle than did other students. Our findings identify a wide range of student experiences associated with positive SEF outcomes that could be enhanced for all students but especially Black students. More involvement of scientists in helping students who participate in SEFs would be particularly valuable.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

High school science fair: Ethnicity trends in student participation and experience

2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recently, innovative high school programs have been described that combine student participation in science fairs with student and teacher curricular support to promote STEM engagement and learning, especially focused on students from under-represented ethnic minorities and low socioeconomic backgrounds [16][17][18]. Such programs are particularly important given low levels of Black, Hispanic, and some other ethnic minority individuals in STEM fields compared with their proportion in the population.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

High School Science Fair: Ethnicity Trends in Student Participation and Experience

Grinnell

Dalley

Reisch

2021

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In this paper, we report ethnicity trends in student participation and experience in high school science and engineering fairs (science fairs). Science fair participation showed significant ethnic diversity. For survey students, the approximate distribution was Asian-32%; Black-11%; Hispanic-20%; White-33%; Other-3%. Black students made up only 4.5% of the students who participated in science fairs beyond the school-only level, whereas students from other ethnic groups were more equally represented. The lower percentage of Black students resulted from a combination of lower science fair participation and lower percentage of students advancing to science fairs beyond the school-only level. Students who advanced to science fairs beyond the school-only level frequently received help from scientists, coaching for the interview, and were not required to participate in science fair. Black students received the least help from scientists and were most likely to be required to do science fair. They also were most likely to receive no help from parents, teachers, or scientists. Asian and Hispanic students (63.8% and 56.8%) indicated greater interest in careers in science and engineering (S&E) compared to Black and White students (43.7% & 50.7%). The most important experiences that correlated with students indicating that science fair increased their interests in S&E were getting help from the internet and/or books and magazines; getting help fine tuning the report; and overcoming obstacles by doing more background research, making a timeline, and perseverance. Black students did not report a positive effect of any of these strategies but experienced time pressure as more of an obstacle than did other students. Our findings identify a wide range of student experiences associated with positive science fair outcomes that could be enhanced for all students but especially Black students. More involvement of scientists in helping science fair students would be particularly valuable.

show abstract

“…Such advantages will not be available to all students. On the other hand, several studies suggest that innovative high school programs that combine student participation in SEFs with student and teacher support have the potential to promote STEM engagement and learning for all students and could be especially valuable for students from under-represented ethnic minorities and low socioeconomic backgrounds [18][19][20][21][22]. Consequently, whether or not SEFs might be able to achieve one of its two original goals -fostering a better understanding of science for everyone [23] --remains an open question.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

High School Science Fair: School Location Trends in Student Participation and Experience

Grinnell

Dalley

Reisch

2023

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The findings reported in this paper are based on surveys of U.S. high school students who registered and managed their science and engineering fair (SEF) projects through the online Scienteer website over the three years 2019/20, 2020/21, and 2021/22. Almost 2500 students completed surveys after finishing all their SEF competitions. Our findings confirmed and extended previous observations regarding differences in students' SEF experiences based on gender and ethnicity. In this paper we report results on high school location. Most students participating in SEFs indicated that they were from suburban schools with some variation depending upon student ethnicity -- Asian-81%, Black-68%, Hispanic-55%, and White-78%. Very few SEF participants -- 3.5% overall -- indicated that they were from rural schools, even though more than 20% of high school students attend rural schools. Urban vs. suburban school location appeared to have little impact on any of the students' SEF experiences. For instance, although Asian and Hispanic students indicated more successful SEF outcomes than Black and White students, Asian students were the most likely to attend suburban schools, whereas Hispanic students were relatively balanced in their attendance at suburban and urban schools. In those instances where we observed statistically significant (p<.05) differences in students' experiences based on school location, students from suburban schools were slightly favored in relationship to students from urban schools but the differences always were small. In conclusion, although most students participating in SEFs come from suburban schools, students participating in SEFs and coming from urban schools can have equivalent SEF experiences, and very few students participating in SEFs come from rural schools.

show abstract

Getting Everyone to the Fair: Supporting Teachers in Broadening Participation in Science and Engineering Fairs

Cited by 7 publications

References 49 publications

High school science fair: Ethnicity trends in student participation and experience

High school science fair: Ethnicity trends in student participation and experience

High School Science Fair: Ethnicity Trends in Student Participation and Experience

High School Science Fair: School Location Trends in Student Participation and Experience

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About