Abstract
Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields are incredibly valuable to the world as innovations can help improve infrastructure and save lives. The United States has called for improvements in mentoring to help build a larger STEM workforce. Many studies and reports have focused on the experience of mentees within communities of practice (COP) to determine mentoring best practices. But few studies have investigated how mentors define their role within the COP. In this study, we provide data from interviews with mentors in a Research Experience for Undergraduate program and a Research Experience for Teachers program. We compare the views of mentors who work with undergraduates to those who work with teachers to highlight the differing views of these two groups and how this affects the type of mentoring provided. Our findings show that mentors struggle to see their role in the RET program since there is not a direct link between mentoring teachers and building the STEM workforce. This is problematic as teachers could be crucial allies in this endeavor.
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Data Availability
The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are not publicly available because at the time of data collection which was approved by the lead author’s human subjects board, participants were told that their interview responses would only be shared with the research team.
Notes
In 2014, 29 students participated in the REU program, 38% identified as female and the majority (83%) were juniors or seniors in college and majoring in the physical sciences or engineering (83%). In 2015, 24 students participated in the REU program, 67% identified as female and the majority were juniors and seniors (86%).
In 2014, the majority of students (89%) provided evidence of improved science identity and a smaller majority (68%) indicated that they improved their understanding of mutual engagement and joint enterprise. In 2015, most respondents provided evidence of improved science identity (~ 70%), and again a smaller majority indicated an improved understanding of mutual engagement (61%) and joint enterprise (65%).
10 teachers each year for two years; 65% identifying as Hispanic or African American, 36% identified as female.
In 2014, 90% of teachers expressed improvement. In 2015, 100% of respondents expressed improvement.
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Acknowledgements
This study was supported by the National Science Foundation, Cooperative Agreement No. DMR-1644779 and DMR-2128556.
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Data collection was performed by Dr. Hughes. Analysis and article preparation were performed by Dr. Hughes, Dr. Davidson, and Dr. Johnson. The first draft of the manuscript was written by all authors and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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All procedures performed in this study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. The study was approved by the Florida State University Human Subjects Board (Nos. 2013.11528 and 2014.14275).
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Hughes, R., Davidson, S.G. & Johnson, K. Meta Mentoring: Mentors’ Reflections on Mentoring. Journal for STEM Educ Res 7, 96–121 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41979-023-00104-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41979-023-00104-x