Education Commons^™

Exploring Factors That Contribute To Stem Transfer Student Sense Of Belonging, Brittney R. Gallant, Cate Pocitari

Student Research Symposium

There is an ongoing disconnect between the number of students who enter college intending to earn a STEM degree and the number of students who persist to degree, this is particularly true for transfer students. Sense of belonging has been named as a STEM persistence factor, yet how that belonging develops for transfer students is largely unknown. Here we used a mixed-methods design to explore the experiences of STEM transfer students at PSU (n=38). Participants completed a survey prior to participating in an interview. The survey and interviews explored their science identity, sense of belonging, and involvement in STEM-related activities. …

Interpersonal Experiential Learning And Cancer Research Training Designed To Enhance The Motivation Of Participating Interns Utilizing Self-Determination Theory: A Longitudinal Study With Photovoice Methodology, Alex Vazquez-Cortes, Dierdre Mckay, Connie Tran, Bridget Bugla, Tiffany Bui, Kaisa Holt, Anthony Phan, Clare Hansen, Amy Lin, Amanda Braley, Lisa Marriott Phd

Student Research Symposium

Historically, the underrepresentation of individuals from disadvantaged backgrounds, disabled, and diverse racial/ethnic groups in STEM fields is prevalent. Equity in stem fields allows for different perspectives and knowledge backgrounds allows for the cognitive diversity needed to tackle complex research topics. The Knight Scholars Program (KSP) aims to support underrepresented and disadvantaged high school and undergraduate students pursuing a research career by teaching them the tools they need to succeed. Spanning over three summers, KSP utilized the Self-Determination Theory (SDT) of motivation to create an inclusive learning environment and to strengthen the high schoolers' motivation to pursue research careers focusing on …

Open Source Learning Materials For Introductory Chemistry Coursework In General, Organic And Biochemistry: Meeting Education Needs From High School To College, Patricia Flatt

Open Educational Resources Symposium

This panel discussion will focus on the development and pilot implementation of an interactive, multimedia online OER resource for the 100-level General, Organic and Biological Chemistry course series. This OER project has been developed by a team of faculty and upper division undergraduate students. The panel will present their team approach to developing these resources and the software utilized to create video tutorials, interactive PDF files, and online quiz materials. Stumbling blocks and program challenges will also be presented.

Statistics: The Text For Student Success, Larry Shrewsbury

Open Educational Resources Symposium

My session is for those looking for an open source textbook for Statistics (MTH 243). As a grant recipient the faculty from both Southern Oregon University and Rogue Community College looked at several open source textbooks for our MTH 243 classes. We first looked at the very popular OpenStax Statistics, but the consensus was that it wasn’t as good as the textbook we’ve been using (Michael Sullivan’s Statistics, Informed Decisions using Data, 4th Edition). So we agreed to keep looking at more open source Statistics textbooks. We came across one that doesn’t seem to be very well known, but some …

Converting Calculus Oer Into A Multimedia Text, Alex Jordan, Carly Vollet

Open Educational Resources Symposium

We have used MathBook XML software to convert two popular OERs for calculus into a multimedia format that

integrates online homework support. We'll demonstrate various features of the output, and the methods we use to edit these OERs. As time permits, we'll peek at some other OER projects that are using MathBook XML.

Our goal is to promote these two particular OERs and also the use of MathBook XML, which, in spite of its name, is an excellent tool for writing OER in all subjects. Potential attendees who are not particularly interested in mathematics may still be interested in the …

How Calculus Students At Successful Programs Talk About Their Instructors, Annie Bergman, Dana Kirin, Ben Wallek

Student Research Symposium

Over the past decade, numerous reports point to the need for national efforts to increase the number of students pursuing and professionals with degrees in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields (see for example NSB, 2007; PCAST, 2012; Thomasian, 2011). According to the PCAST report (2012) increasing the retention rate of the students who enter college intending to major in a STEM field has the potential to significantly decrease the gap between the number of STEM degrees produced and the projected number of STEM degrees needed to sustain the United States position in the global market. While there are …

Mathematics Orality And Literacy, Beverly Orth

Student Research Symposium

To become a mathematician, a student must learn how to "do" mathematics and also how to communicate with other mathematicians. Through a special language, both oral and written, mathematicians share a discourse community. This community extends not only across the boundaries of natural language, but also across centuries. My paper explores the following question: How does a person enter the discourse community of mathematicians? My research shows that learning mathematics parallels the learning of natural language reading and writing. Much like learning a foreign language, learning mathematics has been based mostly on oral tradition. The orality of mathematics learning is …