Middle School Teachers and Undergraduate Mentors Collaborating for Culturally Relevant STEM Education

Abstract

This qualitative multiple case study explores the collaborations between three STEM middle school teachers and three STEM undergraduate mentors of color in an urban school district. Drawing on sociocultural theories and literature on culturally relevant education, we used a comparative thematic approach to explore how mentors contributed to culturally relevant opportunities in STEM curriculum and pedagogy. We found that the partners’ STEM identities, how the teacher positioned the mentor in the learners’ experience, and the teachers’ philosophy of the purpose of engineering influenced the contribution undergraduate mentors could make to rigorous and equitable engineering instruction.

Exploring How Secondary STEM Teachers and Undergraduate Mentors Adapt Digital Technologies to Promote Culturally Relevant Education during COVID-19

“…In situating the undergraduates prominently as knowledgeable others in the classroom, the teachers countered the narrative that only white individuals can be successful in STEM. This supports findings from the authors' earlier work describing how teachers and undergraduates collaborated to promote culturally relevant education in person [45].Teachers' efforts to learn the technologies, find time to schedule Zoom meetings and plan with undergraduates, navigate obstacles for the undergraduates to work with students, and share their students' work with the district and research team speaks to their dispositions towards social justice and why they are recognized as STEM leaders.…”

“…The teachers were open-minded and flexible in the planning and teaching with an undergraduate, providing undergraduates with autonomy to form an authentic presence in the classroom. These attributes align with successful collaborative practices between teachers and undergraduates in the prior study by the authors [45]. All of the teachers positioned themselves in ways to support students in their pacing, organization, and accountability, which further promoted relationships to be built between undergraduates and students.…”

“…Several of our participants also had small children at home so they had to navigate teaching online, while also supervising their own children's' virtual learning at home at the same time. Our work with teachers and undergraduates pre-pandemic did show great promise for teaching science and mathematics standards through engineering challenges [45]. To address the issues of time constraints, we encouraged dyads to communicate early and often and asked them to identify and share their preferred mode of communication with each other.…”

“…We analyzed teacher-mentor conversations as well as the roles that the undergraduate and teacher assumed during classroom implementation. We found that undergraduates showed promise for promoting a more culturally relevant approach to engineering and supported teachers to create engineering design challenges that focused on the needs of individuals and communities (e.g., creating a device that will sort recyclable and non-recyclable materials; redesigning the blueprints of a school that was about to close in the district) [45]. We also found that culturally relevant education opportunities occurred when teacher partners had a student-centered philosophy to teaching STEM, when teachers positioned mentors as prominent figures in their classrooms, and when teachers and undergraduate mentors approached engineering through a humanistic and socio-political lens [45].…”

“…We found that undergraduates showed promise for promoting a more culturally relevant approach to engineering and supported teachers to create engineering design challenges that focused on the needs of individuals and communities (e.g., creating a device that will sort recyclable and non-recyclable materials; redesigning the blueprints of a school that was about to close in the district) [45]. We also found that culturally relevant education opportunities occurred when teacher partners had a student-centered philosophy to teaching STEM, when teachers positioned mentors as prominent figures in their classrooms, and when teachers and undergraduate mentors approached engineering through a humanistic and socio-political lens [45]. Unfortunately, in March of 2020, the partnership and instructional activities were halted because of the COVID-19 pandemic; most students never had the opportunity to evaluate their designed prototypes, as they abruptly shifted to remote learning.…”