From Theory to Practice: The “Messy” Realities of a Communal Relevance Intervention in STEM Classrooms

• In Event: From Idea to Impact: Candid Reflections on Building Interventions

Abstract

Objectives: The primary goal of our project was to engage Black and Latinx middle schoolers in STEM elective classrooms by structuring an intervention that emphasized the relevance of STEM activities in terms of their communal benefits. We examined how students’ behavioral engagement was explained by their perception of STEM activities as communal learning opportunities and how curricular and instructional design contributed to this process.

Theoretical Framework: We investigated the construct of relevance from a race-reimaged perspective (DeCuir-Gunby & Schutz, 2014)—conceptualizing it as a culturally responsive instructional practice. The Praxis of Teaching for Freedom (King & Swartz, 2016) served as a guiding lens for doing so. Our work is situated at the intersection of educational psychology and teacher education, building conceptual bridges between motivation research and culturally relevant education (Kumar, Zusho, & Bondie, 2018). The intervention itself was grounded in the concept of communalism—a cultural continuity for Black and Latinx students (Boykin, 1986) and its parallel concept of familismo.

Methods and Data Sources: Our mixed-methods sequential explanatory design (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2018) emerged from a research-practice partnership where methods were continuously adapted to the realities of the school environment. Data sources included repeated student surveys, observer ratings of classroom instruction, follow-up teacher interviews, and student focus groups. This process required numerous "in-the-weeds" methodological decisions that are often omitted from final publications. These iterations ranged from the co-design of the curriculum unit with teachers to the pragmatic use of single-item survey measures to reduce participant burden.

Results: Learning from Instructive “Failures”: Our quantitative results revealed a significant and instructive challenge. While students reported being more engaged in lessons they rated as relevant for “serving humanity” and “serving one another,” we found that perceived relevance for “serving the community” was not a significant predictor of their engagement. As we walk through in Table 1, this unexpected null finding became our most instructive learning opportunity. Our qualitative data revealed this apparent "failure" stemmed not from faulty theory, but from our own misstep in assuming students had a strong pre-existing, working concept of “community.” Teachers explained that students first needed this abstract concept cultivated before they could connect it to their schoolwork. This need for adaptation was a recurring theme throughout the study, from flexibly altering intervention pacing to developing reconciled observer ratings to address reliability issues.

Scholarly Significance: This study makes two key contributions for this symposium. First, it offers a theoretical advancement by demonstrating that communal relevance interventions are not monolithic; their success is contingent upon careful scaffolding of foundational concepts. Second, it provides a practical takeaway from the research process itself. By showcasing the "messiness" detailed in Table 1—from instrument design compromises to responsive changes in intervention delivery—we argue that true fidelity is not rigid adherence to a script, but flexible adaptation to achieve an intervention's goals. For fellow researchers, the key lesson is that our most valuable insights often emerge from navigating, and learning from, the instructive "failures" encountered in real-world settings.

Authors

• DeLeon Gray, North Carolina State University

• Tamika L. McElveen, Miami University (OH)

• Briana Green, Michigan State University

• Lauren H. Bryant, North Carolina State University