Institutional, Programmatic, Departmental and Faculty Strategies for Broadening Participation in the Geosciences

Systemic changes are needed to facilitate increased participation by students from underrepresented groups in the geosciences. Institutions of higher education and departments must be committed; faculty must have access to professional development in areas such as cultural sensitivity and literacy, and in "best practices" in instruction for all students; systemic reform requires alignment of higher education goals and practices with K-12 education and clear lines of articulation with 2-Year Colleges (2YCs).

Institutional, Programmatic and Departmental Resources

• Building Strong Geoscience Departments -- includes advice and case studies on curricula, departmental programs, definition of strong departments, resources for heads and chairs, advice on how to promote your department, program assessment, student recruitment, and much more.
• Resources for Strategies for Recruiting a Diverse Faculty -- from the NAGT Building Strong Geoscience Departments program.
• Increase the Diversity of your Graduates -- developed by the InTeGrate program.
• Broadening Access to the Earth and Environmental Sciences: Increasing the Diversity of Undergraduate Students Learning About the Earth -- developed by the InTeGrate program.
• Strengthen Workforce Preparation in Your Program -- developed by the InTeGrate program.
• Examples of Successful Programs -- from the InTeGrate program.
• Why Focus on Diversity -- from the InTeGrate program.

Faculty Professional Development Needs

Effective Instruction by ALL faculty, to promote learning by ALL students

• Preparing for an Academic Career in the Geosciences for senior graduate students and post-docs who seek careers in academia, from the On the Cutting Edge program.
• Early Career Geoscience Faculty Teaching, Research, and Managing Your Career for pre-tenure faculty, from the On the Cutting Edge program.
• Designing Innovative and Effective Courses that focus on student-centered learning, clear articulation of Student Learning Outcomes, alignment of assessments with these learning goals, and active learning strategies, from the On the Cutting Edge program.

Advice on Mentoring

• Preparing Mentors -- Advice from the GEO-REU network, hosted at UCAR SOARS.
• Institute for Broadening Participation Mentoring Manual.
• Collaborating with Students -- from On the Cutting Edge, Early Career workshop program.
• Mentoring for Transitions--After the Bachelors -- from On the Cutting Edge.
• Practice Good Advising and Mentoring -- from InTeGrate.
• Mentoring -- from Resources for Research Ethics Education; a rich compilation of information and guidelines for ethical approaches to mentoring students.
• On Being a Scientist: A Guide to Responsible Conduct in Research: Third Edition, 2009, National Academy Press, Advising and Mentoring on pages 4-7.

Cultural Literacy/Competency/Sensitivity

• Ladson-Billings, G. (1995) But that's just good teaching! The case for culturally relevant pedagogy. Theory into Practice, 34(3), 160-165.
• Lee, C. D. (2007) Culture, Literacy, and Learning: Taking Bloom in the Midst of the Whirlwind. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
• McIntyre, E., Rosebery, A., & Gonzalez, N. (Eds.) (2001) Classroom Diversity: Connecting Curriculum to Students' Lives. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
• Sanchez-Casal, S. & MacDonald, A. A. (2009) Identity In Education: Future of Minority Studies. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Develop Cultural Competency -- from InTeGrate.
• Developing your Cultural Competency: Individual actions to improve the climate for all -- a workshop presented by Gary Weissmann at the 2015 Earth Educators' Rendezvous.

The Critical Role of 2 year Colleges

• SAGE 2YC, Supporting and Advancing Geoscience Education in Two-Year Colleges -- Modules on Workforce, Transfer and Careers and Supporting Student Success.
• Geoscience in 2 year Colleges
  Show Details
  Hide
  This project brought together 2YC faculty from across the country for a planning workshop in 2010 to discuss issues facing them and to propose strategies and mechanisms to strengthen the 2YC geoscience education community. The website hosts essays on the state of 2YC education, teaching activities, and course descriptions submitted by 2YC faculty as well as several discussion and networking venues.
• Hands-on, data-rich, and socially relevant geoscience activities for 2YC classrooms: An introduction to InTeGrate modules -- developed by the InTeGrate project.
• Community Colleges in the Evolving STEM Education Landscape: Summary of a Summit -- National Academy Press (2012).
• Barger, M., Gilbert, R., & Boyette, M. (2014, Spring). Florida's Engineering Technology Associate of Science Degree Program: A Model for Technical Workforce STEM Based Education. Journal of Engineering Technology, 31(1), 38-49.

K-12, Next Generation Science Standards, and Diversity (pre-Baccalaureate)

Cultivate broad participation in the geosciences by engaging colleagues in K-12 classes, promote adoption and use of the Next Generation Science Standards!

• Diversity for Innovation for the Geosciences
  Show Information About DIG
  Hide
  -- The Diversity for Innovation for the Geosciences alliance in Texas and SERC have created curated online course road maps, or blueprints, for use in high school Earth and Space Science classes. Each blueprints contains 3-week units for a one-year Earth Science course (scope and sequence) with links pre-existing, exemplary, high quality, research-based Earth system science learning activities that are aligned with Texas state standards, the Earth Science Literacy Principles, and the NGSS. A blueprint is an EXAMPLE of what to teach, in what order, for how long, and identifies which online resources to use of the thousands available. Units and blueprints are in the process of going public.

Supporting Systemic and Sustainable Change

How to get "buy-in" and broad application of "best practices" by skeptical colleagues, administrators.....

• Jeff Froyd's invited presentation Interactive Development and Dissemination for Broader, Sustained Adoption of Research a Innovations in Engineering Education (PowerPoint 2007 (.pptx) 5.4MB Aug7 15) -- learn more about the Increase the Impact website developed by Jeff Froyd, and a short article on Designing Educational Innovations for Sustained Adoption: A How-to Guide for Education Developers (Acrobat (PDF) 493kB Jul20 15) who want to Increase the Impact of their Work'], the executive summary of the Increase the Impact project report.
• Tamara Ledley recommended articles on Collective Impact
  • Kania, J., and Kramer, M., 2011, "Collective Impact", Stanford Social and Innovation Review
  • Hanleybrown, F., Kania, J., and Kramer, M., 2012, "Channeling Change: Making Collective impact Work, Stanford Social and Innovation Review"
  • Ledley, T.S., Gold, A.U., Niepold, F., and McCaffrey, M., 2014, "Moving toward collective impact in climate change literacy: the climate literacy and energy awareness network (CLEAN)", Journal of Geoscience Education, v. 62, 307-318.
  • Community input on defining an overarching backbone network to maximize the collective impact on climate literacy summary.

Evaluating Diversity Programs

• Measuring Diversity--An Evaluation Guide for STEM Graduate School Leaders -- American Association for the Advancement of Science (2011).
• Clewell, B.C. & Fortenberry, N. (Eds.), Bramwell, F., Campbell, P.B., Clewell, B.C., Davis, D., Fortenberry, N., García, A., Nelson, D., Thomas, V.G., Stoll, A. (2009) Framework for Evaluating Impacts of Broadening Participation Projects: Report from a National Science Foundation Workshop. The National Science Foundation.
• Hood, S., R. Hopson & H. Frierson (Eds.) (2005) The Role of Culture and Cultural Context In Evaluation: A Mandate for Inclusion, the Discovery of Truth and Understanding in Evaluative Theory and Practice. Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.
• LaFrance, J. (2004) Culturally competent evaluation in Indian Country. Special issue: In search of cultural competence in evaluation: Toward principles and practices. New Directions for Evaluation, No. 102, 39-50. Jossey-Bass and the American Evaluation Association.
• LaFrance, J. & Nichols, R. (2010) Reframing Evaluation: Defining an Indigenous Evaluation Framework. The Canadian Journal of Program Evaluation, Vol. 23, No. 2, Pages 13–31.
• The National Science Foundation, Directorate for Education and Human Resources, Division of Research, Evaluation, and Communications (2002) The Cultural Context of Educational Evaluation: A Native American Perspective. Workshop Proceedings, April 25-26, 2002.