Figured Worlds and the Interface Between National d/Discourses on STEM, Structural Inequalities, and STEM Outcomes

• In Event: Nondominant Students Negotiate Histories, Institutions, Figured Worlds, and Identities to “Become Somebody” in STEM

Abstract

This paper examines the ways in which high-achieving, non-dominant students construct STEM identities over time in two non-selective, STEM-focused, urban secondary schools. Drawing upon ethnographic and longitudinal survey data, we demonstrate the ways in which students construct their identities within a world of sharpening structural inequalities and conflicting discourses relative to national conversations about STEM and the local context of schooling. Data indicate that students construct their identities in ways that sometimes limit rather than expand future opportunities.

In order to make sense of students’ identity work, we employ “figured worlds” (Holland et al., 1998) as a primary tool of inquiry. Lopez-Bonilla (2011) argues: “figured worlds can help us to understand the interface between discourse (language in use) and Discourse (a socially enacted identity)” (p. 50). For Gee (2014), “capital D discourse” constitutes ways of thinking, behaving, and valuing in order to enact a socially recognized identity – to be recognized as a particular type of person (e.g., a “good student”), while “little d discourse” pertains to language in use (Gee, 2014).
Together, these tools help us to interpret decisions and choices non-dominant students make as they construct STEM identities over time. In so doing, we highlight the inextricable relationship between structure and agency as well as the consequences of available opportunities and “choices” during high school.

Data were collected via semi-structured interviews of students, teachers, counselors and principals from students’ sophomore through senior years of high school, and follow up surveys and interviews 3 years post high school. We developed case displays for each student of STEM/academic instantiations, critical moments, and post college/future plans that were organized temporally. This enabled us to identify: (1) themes in student authoring of academic and STEM identities over time; and (2) schooling/discursive practices over high school and college years.

As national d/Discourses on STEM move through educational reform initiatives into under-resourced schools, data make clear that students construct academic identities within spaces that communicate d/Discourses that differ markedly from dominant d/Discourses surrounding STEM education. Despite aggressive attempts to establish dominant STEM-focused d/Discourses within sampled institutions, schools were unable to provide the types of academic capital needed for the STEM careers toward which students had been encouraged to aspire. Students expressed aspirations to become aerospace engineers and forensic scientists, yet were not provided with opportunities (high level course offerings in math/science), visible models (people who hold these types of careers), or college- and field-specific literacies necessary to pursue desired fields. In the absence of dominant STEM d/Discourses in spaces where non-dominant students live and learn, many came to rely on popular culture to fill in gaps of what it means to be a doctor (Grey’s Anatomy) or forensic scientist (Law and Order). Findings demonstrate that students who identified and were identified by others as “good at STEM” were unable to enact dominant STEM d/Discourses in these schools, thus starkly limiting their STEM opportunities/ outcomes.

Authors

• Amy Elizabeth Stich, Northern Illinois University

• Kristin Cipollone, Ball State University

• Rachel Fix Dominguez, University at Buffalo - SUNY

• Lois Weis, University at Buffalo - SUNY