The Synergies Project: Co-Creating a Community-Wide Science Learning System

• In Event: Equity and Access in Science: Understanding Pathways Frameworks for Youth Learning and Development

Abstract

SYNERGIES, a participatory research and development effort based in an under-resourced community in thriving city in the pacific northwest, seeks to engage this community in understanding how science interest develops and how science education providers (formal and informal) can work collaboratively to support that development. We focus on interest rather than other constructs (e.g. attitudes, knowledge, school performance) because children who have an interest in science are more likely to be motivated science learners and children whose interest in science is developed and sustained are likely to become adults who pursue science interests at home and at work and make science decisions (Barron, 2006; Lipstein & Renninger, 2007).

Science interest also has a developmental component, critical to the age group focus focused upon in this research. Recent studies suggest that the time period between middle childhood and adolescence is when important shifts in interest likely occur, with important consequences for the pursuit of further science education, avocations and possibly careers (Tai, Liu, Maltese, & Fan, 2006). Although we know little about this critical period, we do know that it aligns with other developmental changes such as higher expectations for commitment and participation based on achievement and a transition to children becoming more active agents of their own learning (Harter, 1990). However, the critical triggers – whether guidance, maturation, or the structure of activities, or some combination – are not well understood (Hidi, 1990).

This on-going longitudinal research study is investigating whether, and if so how, youth from ages 10 to 15 in a diverse, under-resourced urban community become interested and engaged in science. In addition to collecting data about youth pathways in, through and with science (with a science interest and participation questionnaire; n=250 and intensive case studies conducted in youths’ homes; n=20), we have also developed approaches for empowering the community itself to envision and create a better, more effective community-wide science education system. This approach recognizes the science learning opportunities that already exist in communities, but are hidden, particularly within poor, underserved neighborhoods. The premise is that if one more fully understood how and why people develop science-related interests through the utilization of science resources and engagement in science activities, it should be possible to create a more synergistic and effective science education system for all. Our study seeks to improve understanding of how science interest develops during adolescence, and how a variety of community resources and out-of-school activities support that development.

Data were collected over four years, but the last two years have also experimented with possible interventions and worked with partners to develop a community-wide educational plan. We are now working collaboratively with our informal and formal educational partners to develop sets of customized, connected and coordinated learning interventions, in school and out, based on interest data we have collected, for youth with different backgrounds, needs and interests, with the goal of averting, or dampening the well-documented decline of science interest and participation during early adolescence.

Authors

• Lynn Diane Dierking, Oregon State University

• John Falk, Oregon State University

• Nancy Staus, Oregon State University

• Jennifer Nicole Wyld, Oregon State University

• Deborah Bailey, Oregon State University

• William R. Penuel, University of Colorado - Boulder