Santa Clara University

Improving and Assessing the Impact of Programs to Encourage High School Girls to Pursue Science, Engineering, and Mathematics

Submitted by Ruth E. Davis
Computer Engineering Department

Project Goals and Objectives

The proposed workshop has two major goals:

• to provide an opportunity for those who have run and/or intend to run programs to enhance the interest, success, and retention of women and girls in science, engineering, and mathematics, to share strategies and experience (failures and successes) in order to improve the design of such programs; 
• to develop an assessment plan that can reasonably be applied nationwide, collecting long term follow-up data on students who apply to such programs (including nonparticipating applicants) that will allow combination of the results from several programs in order to determine larger effects than can be determined from the small sample represented by each individual program.

Project Description

I will run a two and a half day workshop for 30 to 40 participants who are currently involved in the design and/or implementation of a program to encourage the interest and success of high school age women and minorities in pursuing higher education and careers in science, engineering, and/or mathematics. In addition to the workshop itself, I will be setting up a website for the workshop participants (as well as other programs) to use in collecting and analyzing data on the participation of women in science, engineering, and mathematics, from high school on into their career lives.

Anticipated Outcomes and Impact

Program Improvement
I expect that the sharing of the collective experience of the participants will have a tremendous impact on the quality of programs to encourage women and underrepresented minorities in SEM. In addition to the participants taking back the collective wisdom represented by these programs, the information will be posted on the workshop website. The website will contain all of the position papers, links to all of the programs that provide them, and summaries of the discussions on best practices and evaluation techniques.

Guidelines for New Programs
Besides providing a valuable resource for the improvement of programs, the website will provide information that can be used by programs that are just starting up to guide both the design of their programs and the design of their assessment instruments.

Assessment of Nationwide Impact
I expect the design of a common core of data to enable long term assessment of the success of these programs in improving the participation, success, and advancement of women in science, engineering, and mathematics throughout the country. Having a nationwide base will allow evaluation of the effect of these programs as a whole, without being overly concerned about the peculiarities of individual programs

Budget

 I have already secured funding for most of the project from the National Science Foundation. However, I neglected to account for the tremendous amount of paperwork that will be necessary immediately following the workshop. (I need to process check requests to reimburse travel expenses for all the participants, provide stipends to participants and a consultant, and do quite a bit of work in designing, collecting, and analyzing evaluation forms and setting up database links with the website.)

I would like to hire an administrative assistant for the month of August to help with the details of making the workshop run smoothly as well as assisting with the cleanup paperwork and the setup of the online databases after the workshop. Our department administrative assistant is on a nine-month appointment, and would be available for the month of August.

One month salary: 2792.37
Benefits @8.7%: 242.94

Total budget request: 3035.31

Improving and Assessing the Impact of Programs to Encourage High School Girls to Pursue Science, Engineering, and Mathematics

Final Report
Submitted by Ruth E. Davis
Computer Engineering Department

The project had two major goals:

• to provide an opportunity for those who have run and/or intend to run programs to enhance the interest, success, and retention of women and girls in science, engineering, and mathematics, to share strategies and experience (failures and successes) in order to improve the design of such programs;
• to develop an assessment plan that can reasonably be applied nationwide, collecting long term follow-up data on students who apply to such programs (including nonparticipating applicants) that will allow combination of the results from several programs in order to determine larger effects than can be determined from the small sample represented by each individual program.

I ran a two and a half day workshop for 44 participants who are currently involved in the design and/or implementation of a program to encourage the interest and success of high school or middle school age women and minorities in pursuing higher education and careers in science, Technology, engineering, and/or mathematics. In addition to the workshop itself, I set up a website for the workshop participants (as well as other programs) to use in collecting and analyzing data on the participation of women in science, engineering, and mathematics, from high school on into their career lives. The website established for and as a result of the workshop is located at

http://www.scu.edu/SCU/Projects/NSFWorkshop99/

This website contains all of the position papers, links to all of the programs that provided them, and summaries of the discussions on best practices and evaluation techniques. In addition to the material summarizing the workshop, the website provides the first drafts of surveys to be used nationwide by many programs in order to assess the collective impact of these programs. I used the money provided by the CSTS to hire an administrative assistant for the month of August to help with the details of making the workshop run smoothly as well as assisting with the cleanup paperwork and the setup of the online databases after the workshop.