In today’s climate of rising economic inequality, drone warfare, xenophobic politics, and Big Brother technology, understanding how we might best design learning environments to provide opportunities for expanding the purpose and potentialities of STEM education for minoritized communities grows in importance daily. This dissertation is a 3-part study that examines the impact of a 6-day civics coding camp implemented in Chicago, Illinois, and Kingston, Jamaica. The program was designed to empower high school girls to see themselves as purposeful, powerful agents of change in their communities. The curriculum presented coding, design-thinking, and leadership as inter-connected, inter-dependent resources for civic engagement. The first study describes the ways in which a STEM-focused non-profit organization negotiated and grappled with equity from its inception to three years after its pilot program. The second study is a quantitative analysis of changes in coding, leadership, and design-thinking self-efficacies over the course of the intervention. The third study examines students’ understanding of inequality. Together these studies offer Learning Scientists and practitioners interested in developing interdisciplinary STEM programs design principles to further equity-oriented work.

Creator

• Bethune, Anna Priscilla

DOI

• https://doi.org/10.21985/n2-vxwz-fh72

Subject

• Caribbean studies
• Education

Language

• en

Alternate Identifier

• http://dissertations.umi.com/northwestern:15388
• etdadmin_upload_780217

Keyword

• Equity
• STEM Education
• Inequality
• Self-efficacy
• Civics
• Stratification Beliefs

Date created

• 2020-01-01

Resource type

• Dissertation

Rights statement

• In Copyright