In Dialogue With Makers and Science Educators: Refugee Youths' STEM Engagement Through a Community-Based Makerspace

• In Event: Learning to Engage: Scientists, Engineers, Educators, and Youth in Learning Collaborations

Abstract

Objectives
The United States serves as a leading resettlement country for refugees world-wide (US Dept. of Homeland Security). The fact that 32% of refugees are under 18 years old (Martin & Yankay 2012) raises critical issues for education. Schools are rarely prepared to address the cultural incongruence and identity dissonances that may engender school struggles for refugee students (Hek 2005; Naidoo, 2009).

Research suggests that high-quality, out-of-school experiences can positively impact engagement/learning, particularly among youth from lower-income communities (e.g. Rahm et al, 2005). Also, the burgeoning “maker movement” has the potential to break down longstanding barriers to learning in STEM. Our study focuses on a community-based STEM maker-club for refugee youth, particularly on the impacts engaging in dialogue with Makers and science educators (adult mentors) have on refugee youths’ Making process.

Our research questions are:
a. How do refugee youth present their Making endeavors to adult mentors?
b. What kinds of dialogic interactions take place between refugee youth and adult mentors, as reflected in online blog communications?
c. What is the impact of such interactions on refugee youths’ Making process and their emerging identities as youth makers?

Theoretical perspective
Non-commodified knowledge (ncK) refers to aspects of students’ real-time experiences and face-to-face relationships that are local, non-economical, and grounded in their community and intergenerational culture (Bowers, 2003), as opposed to standardized, “one-size-fits-all” approaches that may marginalize youth. Tan and Faircloth (2013) have proposed an ncK framework that reconsiders three focal elements of the learning process --What the Learner Brings (identities, resources), What the Learner Does (practices, negotiations with instructor, resistance), and What Counts as Learning (artifacts or signifiers of evidence of learning). We also draw from an expansive learning framework (Engeström & Sannino, 2010) that focuses on both the vertical (science or school-based) and horizontal (everyday experiences) elements pertinent to deep learning (Gutierrez & Vossoughi, 2010).

Methodology
We engaged in longitudinal critical ethnography (18 X 75-min blocks) which privileges multiple perspectives, foregrounds dialogic interactions between researchers/stakeholders, and allows for critique of potentially oppressive relationships between structures and actors (Madison, 2010). This approach was important as we attempted to make sense of how refugee youth, positioned in particular ways because of their refugee and ELL status, engage in, and in dialogue with others about, their STEM/Making activities. Data sources include rich field notes, interviews, blog interactions and youth-produced artifacts.


Findings
The different ways in which refugee youth chose to present themselves and their making process on the program’s makerspace blog, the feedback from adult mentors garnered, and the impact to both refugee youths’ Making process and their emerging identities as youth makers will be discussed. In particular, we conjecture on the ways refugee youth circumvent their ELL challenges in soliciting feedback from adult mentors.

Scholarly significance
There is scarce literature in the field on refugee youths’ interests and engagement in science. This study will provide some insights to these gaps.

Authors

• Edna Tan, University of North Carolina at Greensboro

• Beverly S. Faircloth, University of North Carolina - Greensboro