What Is a STEM School? Opportunities in Inclusive STEM and Traditional High Schools in Denver

• In Event: Comparing Studies of Inclusive STEM High Schools: Three Approaches With Different Findings and Policy Implications

Abstract

Over the past decade, a growing number of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) schools have been established in the U.S. as a response to various calls for improved STEM education and as an effort to attract underrepresented students into fields of STEM. However, STEM schools vary significantly in organization and scope. For example, STEM schools may be stand-alone institutions developed specifically to have a greater emphasis on STEM learning while others may have a STEM-focused program within a larger comprehensive school. In theory, STEM schools adopt an intensive approach to traditional curriculum by increasing the offerings and requirements in science, math, and related subjects; and in general, STEM schools should have a richer set of math and science resources available and requirements that go beyond high school minimums in math and science (Means et al., 2008; NRC, 2011).

There have been few empirical studies, however, of the effectiveness of STEM schools and even fewer have considered whether students who attend STEM-focused schools are any better off than comparable students at non-STEM schools. This ethnographic study addresses these gaps as it compares the opportunity structures for STEM at four roughly comparable public high schools in Denver, Colorado, from 2010-2013. Two of the schools were STEM-focused schools, and two were traditional high schools. Specifically, we compare course offerings, course sequences, and graduation requirements at each school, along with the 10th to 12th grade educational trajectories and academic outcomes of 12 focal students (at each school) chosen from the top 20% of sophomore math and science achievers at their respective schools. All four schools were inclusive (having no admissions requirements) and served majority low-income and minority students. Focal student demographic characteristics closely matched those of their school. Of these data, we asked: 1) what STEM opportunities are available to students at these schools; 2) how do the focal students access these opportunities (e.g., by taking advanced STEM courses or not); 3) what are the focal students’ post-high school plans and how do they change over time during high school; and 4) how do these findings compare between the two kinds of schools?

Findings to date suggest that the STEM high schools did not noticeably increase STEM opportunities, math and science achievement, or high-achieving students’ plans to pursue STEM in college compared to the traditional high schools. In some areas, the traditional high schools were more successful than the STEM-focused schools. In our cases, the promise of a high school focused on STEM was used primarily to re-organize and revitalize low-performing schools and only secondarily to improve STEM education. Data pertaining to the focal students’ post-high school choices (college matriculation, initial major, post-graduation job) will become available during summer, 2013, thus allowing us to present these additional outcomes at AERA 2014.

While STEM schools are perceived as improving student academic achievement and pursuit of post-secondary careers in these fields, findings from this study call into question claims about the effectiveness of inclusive STEM schools for underrepresented students.

Authors

• Carrie D. Allen, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Kristofor Wiley, Drury University

• Margaret A. Eisenhart, University of Colorado - Boulder