STEM Bridges: Evolution of an Academic Library STEM Outreach Program

Flash, Kenya; Allen, Melanie A.; Mack, Thura; Clement, Kristina

doi:10.1080/01930826.2017.1374105

Cited by 14 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…STEM activities and programs, such as science fairs, non-fiction book clubs, and other programming strategies are popular in public libraries, as are displays, reading lists and other readers' advisory services promoting STEM topics (Hopwood, 2012;Myers, Spencer, & Huss, 2013;Roberson, 2015). School libraries support STEM curriculum through similar techniques (Duff, 2012;Lamb, 2016). As contemporary librarianship increases support for STEM fields, one might think that the backgrounds of librarians might also be shifting in this direction.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same: Educational and Disciplinary Backgrounds of American Librarians, 1950–2015

Clarke

Kim

2018

Journal of Education for Library and Information Science

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Discussions of diversity in American librarianship usually focus on gender or ethnicity, but historical studies also show a lack of diversity in educational and disciplinary backgrounds. Librarians traditionally hail from the humanities, especially English and history. But as current educational attention shifts to science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields, are librarians reflecting this change? Anonymized data from ALA-accredited graduate programs from the last five years was collected, coded, and classified to determine librarians' educational and disciplinary backgrounds and in what ways, if any, they differ from the past 65 years and from the contemporary U.S. general population. Unsurprisingly, we found that contemporary librarians still hail predominantly from English and history-a stark contrast from the business and health undergraduate degrees earned by the general U.S. population. Backgrounds in STEM fields remain lacking in librarianship, but librarians with undergraduate education in the arts are on the rise, perhaps supporting the creativity, flexibility, innovation and risk-taking necessary in 21st century libraries.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same: Educational and Disciplinary Backgrounds of American Librarians, 1950–2015

Clarke

Kim

2018

Journal of Education for Library and Information Science

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“…Their results showed an improvement in the students' attitudes and in their high-order thinking skills. Flash, Allen, Mack and Clement [11] reported on a program delivered through a library, the Big Orange STEM Saturday (BOSS), which connects secondary education students with experts in Tennessee (USA). They discussed the benefits of the work they did in stablishing communication between the school and the real world, but the paper does not include any empirical evidence.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Regarding the factors affecting the STEM outreach program effect, there are no references in the reviewed studies [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17] to sex, school context or target participants. Nonetheless, all the referenced outreach programs were focused on pre-university students and had a more intense effect in younger students [16].…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the reviewed literature on the evaluation of STEM outreach programs [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17], if there is any empirical measurement with data collection, the education experiment is not properly designed. Thus, it does not allow for contrasting the participation in the outreach program effect with a group under similar conditions, except for the lack of participation, because they only use a treatment or experimental group.…”

Section: Experimental Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Do Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Experimentation Outreach Programs Affect Attitudes towards Mathematics and Science? A Quasi-Experiment in Primary Education

2020

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Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) outreach programs have been widely studied in recent years considering their possible influence on future STEM career election aiming to counteract the observed decline in enrollment at university. Nonetheless, the presumed effect is not clear due to a lack of comparison with control groups. In order to fill this gap, a quasi-experimental design was adopted to analyze the effect of a STEM experimentation outreach program on 5th and 6th graders. The sample was composed by 453 students, (274 experimental group and 179 control group). The Auzmendi Scale of Attitude towards Mathematics Modified (ASMAm), and the attitude towards school science (ASSci), were used as instruments, and were administered before and after the intervention. The analysis was run with sex, type of school (state and state-funded schools), school environment (rural/urban), and teacher as potential factors. The results show that there is a program effect on the attitude towards mathematics, but not on the attitude towards school science. Regarding the factors, the program effect is associated neither with sex nor with rural/urban schools. However, the program had a more positive effect on the ASSci than on the ASMAm in the state schools, and is mediated by the teacher.

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“…The Zuckerman San Francisco General Hospital Library created an interactive display during two local events to promote awareness of library services (Barr-Walker & Nevels 2018). The University of Tennessee John C. Hodges Library developed outreach programs for secondaryschool students to expose them to science in the university setting (Flash et al 2017). A librarian at the Science and Engineering Information Center of the University at Buffalo utilizes a combination of one-on-one faculty lunches and on-site reference service to answer questions about library resources and increase visibility (Wagner 2015).…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Curiosity as Outreach: Flipping Outreach on its Head

Borrego

Graham

Lutz

et al. 2020

ISTL

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Science and Engineering Library staff at the University of Massachusetts Amherst visited several sites on campus in a novel outreach initiative that involved all nine staff members taking “field trips” without agendas. We demonstrate that outreach without the explicit goal of promoting a specific resource or service can be an effective use of time, and can build social capital that shares the goals of traditional outreach. Involving all staff in this outreach effort was a valuable team building experience, exposing the depth of our interests and expertise to each other and to our campus community.

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STEM Bridges: Evolution of an Academic Library STEM Outreach Program

Cited by 14 publications

References 8 publications

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same: Educational and Disciplinary Backgrounds of American Librarians, 1950–2015

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same: Educational and Disciplinary Backgrounds of American Librarians, 1950–2015

Do Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Experimentation Outreach Programs Affect Attitudes towards Mathematics and Science? A Quasi-Experiment in Primary Education

Curiosity as Outreach: Flipping Outreach on its Head

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