Facilitating Improvement in Undergraduate STEM Instruction: Providing A Research-Based Foundation for the Emerging Class of Change Initiatives Involving Teams

Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo MI

Investigators

Abstract

This project examines empirically the use of teams across the US in initiatives to successfully increase the use of evidence-based teaching practices in undergraduate STEM. It directly addresses the IUSE program goal of improving the knowledge base for increasing the use of evidence-based teaching and learning practices in undergraduate education. The background perspective for this project is the shift in the dominant theory of institutional improvement. For many years, standard practice by those practitioners in the STEM higher education community seeking to improve undergraduate instructional practices has been to seek funding for the development and dissemination of curricular materials and associated instructional practices. These practitioners have predominantly operated alone or in small groups. There is a growing consensus among STEM educators that relying on the principal investigators' efforts to disseminate their own improvements often does not lead to widespread propagation among other educators. For this reason, newer STEM education improvement initiatives are moving towards change strategies focused on encouraging entire academic departments and institutions to increase their use of evidence-based teaching. Increasingly, instructional improvement projects supported by grants are doing this by engaging teams of faculty instructors, graduate student teaching assistants, and post-graduate researchers to collaboratively redesign content and instructional approaches in STEM undergraduate courses, drawing on many of the effective approaches that have been developed over the last several decades. This project will - Develop a national census of undergraduate STEM initiatives using team-based approaches to change; - Synthesize survey and interview data to identify categories that distinguish among team-based approaches; and - Conduct a meta-synthesis-- connecting the categories that emerge from this analysis with extant literature from a wide range of disciplines related to team learning, organizational team structures and processes, and models and theories supporting teams. This project offers substantial value to the research community by exploring and testing theory from a wide range of disciplines. There is a wide range of configurations among the teams used in STEM teaching improvement initiatives. Teams vary in terms of size, composition, goals, leadership, and process. Improved understanding of how effectively teams work for particular goals and outcomes, what kind of leadership and facilitation is needed to keep them vital and on-task, and what kinds of relationships, communication, and collaborative work are necessary for them to reach their goals will bolster the effectiveness of institutional and community transformation efforts. Application of this knowledge has the potential to create improved broader impacts from NSF grants and other improvement initiatives. This project receives co-funding from NSF's EHR Core Research (ECR) program. The ECR program emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that generates foundational knowledge in the field. Investments are made in critical areas that are essential, broad and enduring: STEM learning and STEM learning environments, broadening participation in STEM, and STEM workforce development.