Discovery: Differential Student Impact is Evident Within an Inquiry-focused Secondary/Post-secondary Collaborative STEM Program

Neal I. Callaghan; Jose Luis Cadavid; Huntley H. Chang; Ileana Louise Co; Nicolas Ivanov; Nhien Tran-Nguyen; Jonathan Rubianto; Locke Davenport Huyer; Dawn M. Kilkenny

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Conference: 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access
Location: Virtual On line
Publication Date: June 22, 2020
Start Date: June 22, 2020
End Date: June 26, 2021
Conference Session: Pre-college Engineering Education Division Technical Session 4
Tagged Division: Pre-College Engineering Education
Tagged Topic: Diversity
Page Count: 18
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--34469
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/34469
Download Count: 472

Paper Authors

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Neal I. Callaghan University of Toronto

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Neal Callaghan is a PhD candidate at the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering at the University of Toronto, and a member of the Translational Biology and Engineering program at the Ted Rogers Centre for Heart Research.

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Jose Luis Cadavid University of Toronto orcid.org/0000-0002-9966-7352

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PhD student in Chemical Engineering working on oncological tissue engineering

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Huntley H. Chang University of Toronto orcid.org/0000-0003-3181-8019

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Ileana Louise Co University of Toronto

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PhD student in biomedical engineering working on tissue engineered immune-oncology models

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Dawn Kilkenny earned her Ph.D. in physiology from the University of Western Ontario, Canada, and trained as a postdoctoral fellow in Immunology at Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tenn. After 4 years as a Senior Research Specialist at the Vanderbilt Cell Imaging Resource (CISR) microscope facility, she joined the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering (IBBME), University of Toronto. In addition to instruction, she has acted as the Associate Director, Undergraduate Programs at IBBME as well as the Associate Chair, Foundation Years in the Division of Engineering Science. Currently an Associate Professor, Teaching Stream, she serves as faculty supervisor for the Discovery program and is program co-director for the Igniting Youth Curiosity in STEM Program. Dawn was a 2017 Early Career Teaching Award recipient at U of T and was named the 2016 Wighton Fellow for excellence in development and teaching of laboratory-based courses in Canadian UG engineering programs.

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Abstract

Introduction: Curriculum for high school students who participate in a science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) are generally focused on delivery of knowledge in effort to ensure achievement of learning outcomes related to important scientific concepts in preparation for post-secondary study. Considering a global learning environment of rapid technological change at the cutting edge, curriculum STEM knowledge quickly loses its relevance to application, highlighting the importance in focusing on development of a critical thinking framework for students. In 2016, graduate students at Institution X created Discovery, a collaborative educational program focused on developing and reinforcing critical thinking skills of high school students through inquiry in the context of biomedical engineering (BME) in a post-secondary setting. Evaluation of student performance has revealed the value of this a differential learning environment for students who struggle in a knowledge-focused classroom. Following five terms of activity, the program has recently grown to include participation of a second school from a different socioeconomic region, allowing for assessment of cultural impact of learning. Methods: To date, Discovery has included engagement each term of approximately 25 post-secondary student instructors and 2 faculty members, and has impacted approximately 200 senior science students (Grades 11 & 12; biology, chemistry and physics classes) and 9 STEM educators from two local secondary schools. Graduate student leaders and high school educators collaboratively developed hands-on BME-based practical challenges aligning with school science curricula (new ideation each term), executed by small groups of high school students in capstone format to address course-specific requests for proposals. Entire class cohorts from each school visited campus on different days throughout the term, executing the same project and sharing outcomes at a culminating symposium attended by both schools. To validate student learning in the context of high school curriculum, educators assigned 15% of term course grades to Discovery deliverables. Surveys were administered pre- and post-participation to garner insight into student perceptions of the experience. Student attendance was monitored and grades for on-campus program deliverables were compared to grades for remaining classroom deliverables. Results and Discussion: Combinational assessment of five terms of data from the inaugural participating high school demonstrated positive impact of this inquiry focused differential learning environment. Notably, a cohort of students with reduced success in the knowledge-focused classroom environment excelled during Discovery, displaying average program grades >15% higher than their overall course term average. This suggests the value of Discovery as a learning environment that inspires STEM participation. Program expansion in Spring 2019 saw the addition of a second school, doubling student and instructional participation. Preliminary assessment of one term of multi-school participation presents very different student outcomes, with notably less engagement observed by educators and program instructors in the inquiry-focused program structure. This suggests a potential cultural element to program impact, wherein the socioeconomics of the newest school is higher and educators remarked student attitudes toward more ambiguous learning is resistive. At ASEE 2020, we will expand on our findings to include longitudinal data reflecting variation in student success between these two school cohorts. Conclusions: To date, student and educator engagement and enthusiasm reinforce that Discovery provides a platform to blur the divide between secondary and post-secondary learning, fostering the development of critical thinking skills crucial for the success of future STEM generations. Our current findings suggest a cultural impact to this success, presenting opportunities to tune program structure to meet individual student needs. We anticipate continued positive impact of this program on high school science students this term, regardless of school of origin or previous participation.

Citation
Format

Callaghan, N. I., & Cadavid, J. L., & Chang, H. H., & Co, I. L., & Ivanov, N., & Tran-Nguyen, N., & Rubianto, J., & Davenport Huyer, L., & Kilkenny, D. M. (2020, June), Discovery: Differential Student Impact is Evident Within an Inquiry-focused Secondary/Post-secondary Collaborative STEM Program Paper presented at 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual On line . 10.18260/1-2--34469

TY - CPAPER
AB - Introduction: Curriculum for high school students who participate in a science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) are generally focused on delivery of knowledge in effort to ensure achievement of learning outcomes related to important scientific concepts in preparation for post-secondary study. Considering a global learning environment of rapid technological change at the cutting edge, curriculum STEM knowledge quickly loses its relevance to application, highlighting the importance in focusing on development of a critical thinking framework for students. In 2016, graduate students at Institution X created Discovery, a collaborative educational program focused on developing and reinforcing critical thinking skills of high school students through inquiry in the context of biomedical engineering (BME) in a post-secondary setting. Evaluation of student performance has revealed the value of this a differential learning environment for students who struggle in a knowledge-focused classroom. Following five terms of activity, the program has recently grown to include participation of a second school from a different socioeconomic region, allowing for assessment of cultural impact of learning.
Methods: To date, Discovery has included engagement each term of approximately 25 post-secondary student instructors and 2 faculty members, and has impacted approximately 200 senior science students (Grades 11 &amp;amp; 12; biology, chemistry and physics classes) and 9 STEM educators from two local secondary schools. Graduate student leaders and high school educators collaboratively developed hands-on BME-based practical challenges aligning with school science curricula (new ideation each term), executed by small groups of high school students in capstone format to address course-specific requests for proposals. Entire class cohorts from each school visited campus on different days throughout the term, executing the same project and sharing outcomes at a culminating symposium attended by both schools. To validate student learning in the context of high school curriculum, educators assigned 15% of term course grades to Discovery deliverables. Surveys were administered pre- and post-participation to garner insight into student perceptions of the experience. Student attendance was monitored and grades for on-campus program deliverables were compared to grades for remaining classroom deliverables.
Results and Discussion: Combinational assessment of five terms of data from the inaugural participating high school demonstrated positive impact of this inquiry focused differential learning environment. Notably, a cohort of students with reduced success in the knowledge-focused classroom environment excelled during Discovery, displaying average program grades &amp;gt;15% higher than their overall course term average. This suggests the value of Discovery as a learning environment that inspires STEM participation. Program expansion in Spring 2019 saw the addition of a second school, doubling student and instructional participation. Preliminary assessment of one term of multi-school participation presents very different student outcomes, with notably less engagement observed by educators and program instructors in the inquiry-focused program structure. This suggests a potential cultural element to program impact, wherein the socioeconomics of the newest school is higher and educators remarked student attitudes toward more ambiguous learning is resistive. At ASEE 2020, we will expand on our findings to include longitudinal data reflecting variation in student success between these two school cohorts.
Conclusions: To date, student and educator engagement and enthusiasm reinforce that Discovery provides a platform to blur the divide between secondary and post-secondary learning, fostering the development of critical thinking skills crucial for the success of future STEM generations. Our current findings suggest a cultural impact to this success, presenting opportunities to tune program structure to meet individual student needs. We anticipate continued positive impact of this program on high school science students this term, regardless of school of origin or previous participation.
AU - Neal I. Callaghan
AU - Jose Luis Cadavid
AU - Huntley H. Chang
AU - Ileana Louise Co
AU - Nicolas Ivanov
AU - Nhien Tran-Nguyen
AU - Jonathan Rubianto
AU - Locke Davenport Huyer
AU - Dawn M. Kilkenny
CY - Virtual On line
DA - 2020/06/22
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Discovery: Differential Student Impact is Evident Within an Inquiry-focused Secondary/Post-secondary Collaborative STEM Program
UR - https://peer.asee.org/34469
DO - 10.18260/1-2--34469
ER -