The Value of Support: STEM Intervention Programs Impact Student Persistence and Belonging.

In response to unwaveringly high attrition from STEM pathways, STEM Intervention Programs (SIPs) support STEM students in effort to increase retention. Using mixed methods (survey and focus groups), we studied students at one university who were either supported or unsupported by SIPs to understand how students may differ in experiences believed to contribute to STEM persistence. We evaluated: sense of belonging, scientific self-efficacy, scientific community values, scientific identity, and STEM involvement. The enrollment status of students two and a half years postsurvey was also tracked. SIP students reported significantly higher science identity and sense of belonging and were more involved in STEM-related activities than counterparts unsupported by SIPs. Differences in these measures were correlated with race/ethnicity, college generation status, and age. Notably, SIP students had higher odds of persisting in STEM than students not supported by SIPs. Focus group data provide additional meaning to the measured survey constructs and revealed nuanced qualitative differences between SIP and non-SIP student experiences. Overall, being involved in a SIP at our institution trends positively with theoretical models that explain STEM student persistence. SIPs have the potential to provide and/or facilitate meaningful and critical support, and students without those intentional supports may be left behind.

Thriving or Simply Surviving? A Qualitative Exploration of STEM Community College Students' Transition to a Four-Year University.

Community colleges expand access to higher education and play a key role in efforts to increase and diversify the future science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce. While community colleges increase access to higher education and millions of students attend them for some portion of their education, the experiences of transfer students remain relatively understudied. Transferring during an academic journey can compound the barriers that students already face when pursuing a STEM degree. This study uses Schlossberg's model for analyzing human adaptation to transition to understand how STEM community college transfer students navigate and adapt to the 4-year university. Five semistructured focus groups were conducted with STEM community college transfer students attending an urban university. Analysis of the focus groups resulted in a new model: the amended model of adaptation to transfer transition, or AMATT, which illustrates various factors that played a role in STEM community college transfer students' adaptation a university. Analyses illumined two broad pathways that students tend to diverge into during their transitions-thriving or simply surviving. This work provides a framework for understanding factors influencing the transfer process and ideally will inform institutions and students as they consider maximal transfer student success.

Is This Science? Students' Experiences of Failure Make a Research-Based Course Feel Authentic.

Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) and inquiry-based curricula both expose students to the scientific process. CUREs additionally engage students in novel and scientifically relevant research, with the intention of providing an "authentic" research experience. However, we have little understanding of which course design elements impact students' beliefs that they are experiencing "authentic" research. We designed a study to explore introductory biology students' perceptions of research authenticity in CURE and inquiry classes. Using the Laboratory Course Assessment Survey, we found that students in CURE sections perceived higher levels of authentic research elements than students in inquiry-based sections. To identify specific factors that impact perceptions of research authenticity, we administered weekly reflection questions to CURE students. Coding of reflection responses revealed that experiences of failure, iteration, using scientific practices, and the relevant discoveries in their projects enhanced students' perceived authenticity of their research experiences. Although failure and iteration can occur in both CUREs and inquiry-based curricula, our findings indicate these experiences-in conjunction with the Relevant Discovery element of a CURE-may be particularly powerful in enhancing student perceptions of research authenticity in a CURE.

4-D Computational Modeling of Cardiac Outflow Tract Hemodynamics over Looping Developmental Stages in Chicken Embryos.

Cardiogenesis is interdependent with blood flow within the embryonic system. Recently, a number of studies have begun to elucidate the effects of hemodynamic forces acting upon and within cells as the cardiovascular system begins to develop. Changes in flow are picked up by mechanosensors in endocardial cells exposed to wall shear stress (the tangential force exerted by blood flow) and by myocardial and mesenchymal cells exposed to cyclic strain (deformation). Mechanosensors stimulate a variety of mechanotransduction pathways which elicit functional cellular responses in order to coordinate the structural development of the heart and cardiovascular system. The looping stages of heart development are critical to normal cardiac morphogenesis and have previously been shown to be extremely sensitive to experimental perturbations in flow, with transient exposure to altered flow dynamics causing severe late stage cardiac defects in animal models. This paper seeks to expand on past research and to begin establishing a detailed baseline for normal hemodynamic conditions in the chick outflow tract during these critical looping stages. Specifically, we will use 4-D (3-D over time) optical coherence tomography to create in vivo geometries for computational fluid dynamics simulations of the cardiac cycle, enabling us to study in great detail 4-D velocity patterns and heterogeneous wall shear stress distributions on the outflow tract endocardium. This information will be useful in determining the normal variation of hemodynamic patterns as well as in mapping hemodynamics to developmental processes such as morphological changes and signaling events during and after the looping stages examined here.