"Making" as an educational approach holds promise both for introducing mentors into STEM programming and for showing girls new pathways into STEM (Wittemyer & Gill, 2014). With its merger of cutting-edge technology and traditional arts and crafts, "Making" can help girls learn about electronics, robotics, metalwork,…

Present and future challenges in our society demand a solid science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) knowledge base, innovative thinking, and the ability to ask the right questions to generate multiple solutions. To prepare innovators to meet these challenges, we must recognize and develop their talents. This advancement and growth…

A major aspect of the power of a historically based science story derives from its ability to cultivate interest in the reader or listener. In this paper, we review the research on interest originating from diverse scholarly areas and apply it to the understanding, construction, and effective use of science stories in both formal and informal…

This paper presents findings from a two-phase mixed methods study investigating the phenomenological structure of self-relevance among ninth-grade junior high school biology students (Phase 1: N = 118; Phase 2: N = 139). We begin with a phenomenological multidimensional definition of self-relevance as comprising three dimensions: the academic…

If children have opportunities to develop positive attitudes toward learning science, the pipeline to science careers can be maintained and enhanced. This article describes the development and validation of a short form, 24-item, Assessment of Attitudes in Science Constructs for Fourth Grade (AASC-4) for utilization in future research aimed at…

Every physics teacher wants to give his or her students the opportunity to learn physics well. Despite these intentions, certain groups of students--including women and underrepresented minorities (URMs)--are not taking and not remaining in physics. In many cases, these disturbing trends are more significant in physics than in any other science.…

The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) impact students in substantive ways. These standards move beyond textbooks to emphasize hands-on inquiry focused on real-world phenomena -- making students, rather than teachers, the primary actors in the NGSS science classroom. The six-year NGSS Early Implementers Initiative has supported a group of…

Students majoring in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) are in high demand. Over 1 million STEM graduates will be needed by 2022 to meet the projected workforce needs (The Progress Report on Coordinating Federal Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Education, 2016). If students are needed to fulfill jobs in areas…

Given the current emphasis on science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education and its key attributes, middle school is an optimal time to implement STEM-based curricula. However, the interdisciplinary and open-ended nature of STEM projects often makes implementation difficult. In this article, we describe a professional development…

We assessed the impact of teaching methodological aspects of physics on students' scientistic beliefs and subject interest in physics in a repeated-measurement design with a total of 142 students of upper secondary physics classes. Students gained knowledge of methodological aspects from the pre-test to the post-test and reported reduced…

In order to facilitate policy-driven reforms in science education, it is important to understand how teaching innovations diffuse among teachers and how that adoption process can be catalysed. Little is known about the set of attitudes that makes teachers early or late adopters. In this study, the Concerns-Based Adoption Model (C-BAM) was employed…

A cohort program to increase retention of under-represented groups in chemistry was developed at the College of Saint Benedict/Saint John's University. In particular, this program chose to emphasize early career mentoring and early access to research. This goal was chosen because research has been repeatedly shown to increase scientific identity…

This study reports the implementation of a parental involvement intervention coupled with small group discussions aimed at facilitating transformative experiences (TEs) in science courses (biology and chemistry) in an all-girls middle and high school. Specifically, the goal was to generate parental involvement, TE, and interest. Analyses showed…

This study extends current research by organizing information about students' expectancy-value achievement motivation, in a way that helps parents and teachers identify specific entry points to encourage and support students' science aspirations. This study uses latent class analysis to describe underlying differences in ability beliefs, task…

Recent educational studies have shown increasing lack of interest and participation of youth (ages 10-14 years old) in various STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) fields in the U.S. The decline in the number of youth choosing to study STEM fields in higher education and the resulting lack of STEM professionals in the society…