Should I Stay or Should I Go? Motivation and Persistence in a Gateway Science Course

• In Event: Applying Educational Psychology Lenses to the “Curious Construct of Active Learning” in Undergraduate Science Education

Abstract

Objectives/Purpose: Universities that enroll a diverse undergraduate population of aspiring STEM professionals face high attrition and failure rates in gateway courses. Instructors intensively monitor student achievement - and the assets students may or may not possess – as they plan how to support this tenuous segment who have the potential to grow and broaden the STEM workforce. We examined how instructors can appraise students’ likelihood of persistence in a gateway biology course with a high D, F & Withdrawal rate (DFW >40%) using data that can be obtained early in a semester using quizzing and surveying tools available on university learning management systems – prior knowledge and achievement motivations – to examine students’ likelihood of choosing to persist in the course, remain enrolled but cease to engage, switch to auditor role, or withdraw entirely.

Perspectives/Theoretical Framework: Learners’ achievement-related choices are informed by prior experiences, achievements, and social and cultural factors that inform students’ expectations about their future success and perceptions of the value of tasks they might undertake (Eccles & Wigfield, 1983, 2020). These perceptions are typically studied by surveying one’s belief in their likelihood of success in a task and the dimensions of value a learner perceives a task might confer and costs it might require. These influence decisions learners make while selecting and completing courses (Jiang & Rosenzweig, 2021).

Methods & Data Sources: Data were collected from 352 students from in-person lectures that involved high structure active learning design elements (Eddy & Hogan, 2014; Lombardi, et al., 2021). Students completed biology knowledge pretest and motivation survey measures in weeks 1-2 (Table 1). Instructional units included pre-lecture readings, formative question sets, weekly homework assignments, and engagement with additional (optional) self-testing and exam review resources. Assessments included unit and cumulative final exams.

Results: Multinomial logistic regressions revealed that students who persisted and passed had higher prior knowledge, perceived high intrinsic value and psychological cost and were less performance avoidant than students who failed (Tables 2, 3). Students with higher effort cost perceptions were more likely to disengage (i.e., remain enrolled without completing all exams) than complete or audit (Tables 4, 5) and reported higher intrinsic value than those who withdrew (Table 6). Students who withdrew had higher prior knowledge and perceptions of effort cost than auditors, and higher opportunity cost than those who disengaged.

Significance: Timely degree completion is uncommon (≤50%; Eagen et al. 2010) and lower still for women, minoritized students, and first-generation college students (Chen, 2013). Active learning designs have improved outcomes in STEM courses (Freeman et al., 2014) but may be insufficient to provide the specific, and potentially adaptive support students require. These findings reaffirm and further explain how initial preparedness and perceptions of the course and one’s ability to succeed in it influence the decisions that influence degree progress. These variables were known within weeks, explained variance in achievement-related choices, and could be provided to instructors to inform adaptive supports to help students leverage or improve their preparedness and manage their perceptions as a way of increasing retention, progression and course and degree completion.

Authors

• Robert D Plumley, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill

• Jenifer Utz, University of Nevada - Las Vegas

• Christy Strong, University of Nevada - Las Vegas

• Matthew L. Bernacki, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill