Adolescent women's daily academic behaviors, sexual behaviors, and sexually related emotions

PURPOSE: Emerging literature suggests that the emotional and behavioral experience in young women's romantic/sexual relationships may link to their academic success. However, existing studies' reliance on retrospective and/or global measures prevents detailed understanding of how and when specific academic experiences link to specific relationship experiences and whether these associations could vary over different school days. METHODS: Adolescent women (N = 387; 14-17 years at enrollment) were recruited from primary care adolescent clinics for a longitudinal cohort study of sexual relationships and sexual behavior. Participants provided daily diary information on academic behaviors, sexual emotions, and sexual behaviors. Chi-square and generalized estimating equation ordinal logistic or linear regression, respectively, assessed prevalence of sexual behaviors or differences in sexual emotions when academic behaviors did and did not occur. RESULTS: Young women's weekday reports of skipping school or failing a test were significantly linked to more frequent vaginal sex, less frequent condom use, and different levels of sexual emotions, on that same day. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings provide evidence that the emotional and behavioral experiences in young women's romantic/sexual relationships may impact young women's reaction to academic events

Frameworks to Develop Integrated STEM Curricula

Research-based frameworks can help K-12 schools develop integrated STEM curricula. Two frameworks are presented that describe the characteristics of effective integrated STEM lessons and effective engineering education. The second framework is a modification of the first. Modifications were made to align the framework to a school that was new to integrated STEM. The frameworks have promise for K-12 schools who wish to develop and implement an integrated STEM curriculum that may have different levels of experience and different types of support

The Role of Place Attachment and Situated Sustainability Meaning-Making in Enhancing Student Civic-Mindedness: A Campus Farm Example

This research explores the role that place attachment and place meaning towards an urban farm play in predicting undergraduate students’ civic-mindedness, an important factor in sustainability and social change. In 2017 and 2018, three STEM courses at a private university in the Midwest incorporated a local urban farm as a physical and conceptual context for teaching course content and sustainability concepts. Each course included a four to six-week long place-based experiential learning (PBEL) module aimed at enhancing undergraduate STEM student learning outcomes, particularly place attachment, situated sustainability meaning-making (SSMM), and civic-mindedness. End-of-course place attachment, SSMM, and civic-mindedness survey data were collected from students involved in these courses and combined with institutionally provided demographic information. Place attachment and SSMM surveys, along with the course in which the students participated, were statistically significant predictors of students’ civic-mindedness score

A Pedagogical Framework for the Design and Utilization of Place-Based Experiential Learning Curriculum on a Campus Farm

Campus agriculture projects are increasingly being recognized as spaces impactful to student engagement and learning through curricular and co-curricular programming; however, most campus farm activities are limited to agriculture or sustainability programs and/or co-curricular student clubs. Thus, campus farms are largely underutilized in the undergraduate curriculum, marking a need to explore the efficacy and impact of engaging a diverse array of disciplinary courses in the rich social, environmental, and civic context of local sustainable agriculture. The Farm Hub program presented here incentivizes instructors to refocus a portion of existing course content around the topic of local, sustainable agriculture, and reduces barriers to using a campus farm as a situated learning context for curricula. A pedagogical framework founded in place-based experiential learning (PBEL) theory was developed to guide instructors in the development and implementation of 4–6-week inquiry-based PBEL modules embedded in existing courses. The framework was converted into a research protocol to quantify program implementation fidelity and PBEL best practice adherence for the proposed lesson plans (intended) and their implementation (applied). The framework enables the development of a cohesive cross-curricular program so that the impact of implementation fidelity and best practice adherence to student learning outcomes in scientific literacy, place attachment and meaning, and civic mindedness can be assessed and the results utilized to develop a formal farm-situated PBEL pedagogical taxonomy. This framework can be applied to PBEL curriculum in natural spaces beyond campus farms

Students\u27 Perspectives of Thinking With Algebra

Thinking With Algebra (TWA) is a curriculum development project for college students needing introductory/intermediate algebra. Unique guiding principles of the project are a focus on algebraic structure, mixed review, equity, and a classroom approach emphasizing small-group work and whole-class discussion (Feikes et al., 2022). Results are derived from a survey given to one class of fifteen students taking an intermediate algebra summer course. The paper shares both Likert and open-ended responses. Data demonstrates that the students believed that the TWA curriculum was beneficial

Characteristics of two outstanding elementary teachers of mathematics: Implications for teacher education

This study identifies characteristics of two “outstanding” elementary teachers of mathematics who were different in style and who taught in different settings. The intent is to determine what characteristics make these different teachers outstanding in hopes of helping preservice teachers improve their teaching of mathematics. Preliminary findings indicate that both teachers were (1) focused on children’s learning of mathematics; (2) focused on the mathematical solution methods used by students; (3) believed that all of their students could learn mathematics; (4) were enthusiastic and dedicated to the profession of teaching; and (5) cared deeply about their students and emphasized the necessity of building relationships with them

Exploring Ethical Development from Standard Instruction in the Contexts of Biomedical Engineering and Earth Science

Ethics continues to be required in the accreditation of engineers. However, ethics is seldom the core focus of departmental instruction. Yet, standard instruction may have myriad impacts on students' ethical development. This study explores students’ ethical formation when ethics is a peripheral or non-intentional aspect of instruction in departmental courses in Biomedical Engineering and Earth Science. The research question that we seek to address is, “In what different ways and to what extent does participation in departmental engineering and science courses cultivate STEM students’ ethical formation?” To address our research question, we disseminated a survey to students before (pre) and after (post) their participation in one of 12 courses offered in Earth Science or Biomedical Engineering during the Fall 2017 or Spring 2018. The survey included four instruments: (1) the Civic-Minded Graduate scale; (2) the Interpersonal Reactivity Index; (3) two relational constructs developed by the authors; and (4) the Defining Issues Test-2. Results suggest that current Earth Science curriculum, overall, positively contributes to students' ethical growth. However, the Biomedical Engineering courses showed no evidence of change. As the Earth Science courses do not explicitly focus on ethics, one potential explanation for this trend is the community-engaged nature of the Earth Science curriculum. These findings will be beneficial locally to help direct improvements in departmental STEM instruction. In addition, these findings pave the way for future comparative analyses exploring how variations in ethical instruction contribute to students' ethical and professional formation. © 2019 American Society for Engineering Educatio

148. Exploring the Impact of College Students' COVID-19- and Capitol Insurrection-Related Horizontal and Vertical Collectivism/Individualism on Emotional Reaction to Those Events

This article is made available for unrestricted research re-use and secondary analysis in any form or be any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for the duration of the World Health Organization (WHO) declaration of COVID-19 as a global pandemic.Purpose: While many studies have explored individuals’ feelings related to recent national events, none have explored the relationship of individualism and collectivist leanings caused by these events on the individuals emotions related to those events. For this research we specifically focus on the COVID-19 Pandemic and the January 6 Capitol Insurrection. Methods: Data were collected from college students at a small, private midwestern private university over a 10-day period at the end of January and the beginning of February 2021. A Qualtrics survey was sent to 1,041 students who had completed a similar survey 5 months earlier related to their feelings about the COVID-19 pandemic. We used a subsample (N=314 students; 74.2% female; 83.4% White; 0.6% freshman, 24.5% sophomores, 34.7% juniors and 29.3% seniors) who provided complete data. Measures included horizontal (“We are the same, high freedom, equality”) and vertical (“I am different, Authority ranking, high freedom”) individualism as well as horizontal (“We are the same, share, less freedom”) and vertical (“I am different, sharing, authority ranking”) collectivism. Participants also provided data on the positive and negative affective responses to COVID-19 and to the January 6 Capitol Insurrection. Structural equation modeling was used to investigate the direct effects between individual and collectivism and the affective responses to each event (all standardized; Stata v. 17.0). Global fit was evaluated using the chi-square test and the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA). Local fit was addressed using the Comparative Fit Index (CFI) and the Tucker Louis Index (TLI). We also investigated group differences by gender (male/female) and race (minority/white) where significant overall direct effects were observed. Results: Fit indices (Chi-sq[df]: 60.99[31], p<.001; RMSEA[90% CI]: 0.046[0.035-0.076); CFI: 0.972; TLI: 0.905) suggested the specified model provided a good fit to the data. Higher COVID VI was associated with higher positive (B=0.12) and negative (B=0.15) affective reactions to COVID (B=0.12). Higher Capitol HI and HC were both associated with higher positive (both: B=0.21) and higher negative (B=0.12-0.23) affective reaction to the capitol riots. Higher COVID VI was associated with lower negative affective response (B=-0.16) to COVID. We observed no gender or race/ethnicity differences in these significant effects. Conclusions: Students who felt more strongly that people were the same (horizontal individualism and horizontal collectivism) were more likely to have both strong positive and negative emotions to the Janury 6th insurrection. For COVID-19 negative feelings, students whose feelings towards COVID were more individualistic had mixed results. Those who believed people are different (vertical individualism) were more likely to have lower negative feelings towards COVID-19 while those who believed people are the same (horizontal individualism) had greater negative feelings. These data have implications for scaffolding young adult support in advance of future socio-political emergencies

The effects of implementing recitation activities on success rates in a college calculus course

Over a period of six years, three different types of recitation sessions were implemented into the large enrollment section of a college calculus course. During the fall semesters, the results on the departmental final examination, the DFW rates, and the one-year retention rates of students as STEM majors were examined by the type of recitation session used with the large enrollment section. The three types of recitation sessions studied were: (1) optional mentoring sessions at the Math Assistance Center conducted by undergraduate students (peer mentors), (2) required mentoring sessions conducted by graduate students, and (3) required VGNA (Verbal, Graphical or Geometric, Numeric, and Algebraic) Concept activities, which were also coupled with mentoring sessions conducted by graduate students. The success of the students in the large enrollment section of the course, which included one of the three different types of recitation sessions, was compared to the success of students in the small enrollment sections of the course (enrollments less than 50 students). The effects of using each type of recitation session on raising departmental final examination scores, lowering DFW rates, and raising one-year retention rates is presented. The results of this study demonstrate methods of raising student success rates in large enrollment (lecture-format) courses

The Integrating Community Engaged Learning through Ethical Reflection (ICELER) Faculty Learning Community Theory of Change and Learning Goals, Years 1-4

This document presents the final ICELER theory of change, including annually generated FLC goals that were part of a multi-year institutional transformation grant #1737157 entitled Institutional Transformation: Enhancing IUPUI STEM Curriculum through the Community-Engaged Learning and Ethical Reflection Framework (I-CELER)National Science Foundation Grant#1737157 STEM Education Innovation and Research Institute IUPUI Center for Service and Learnin