Proliferation of STEM High School Policies and Opportunity Structures: The Denver Case

• In Event: STEM Policies and Pathways in Two Cities Differently Positioned in the Global Economy

Abstract

This presentation focuses on the concept of STEM-related school opportunity structures in general and their form in 4 public high schools in Denver. McFarland (2006) argued that high schools offer a variety of “mobility systems” through which students experience academic opportunities. Some systems promote upward movement into more demanding courses, while others encourage students to move on at the same level or to stop taking coursework in that subject. These systems are created in part by structural constraints, e.g., the courses offered, the prerequisites required, all of which encourage or discourage subsequent moves including those that are STEM-related. Students help create such mobility systems as they respond to signals of ability (especially grades). Such signals lead students to consider whether they are suited for certain subjects and to respond accordingly, e.g., take more advanced courses, see themselves as “not very good at math.” McFarland‘s analyses suggest that actual career paths in high school math are determined primarily by organizational rules and opportunities, secondarily by student responses, and lastly by student background characteristics.

Similar processes occur with other school activities and services. For example, experiences with technology and with extracurricular activities can be organized in particular ways, thus affording additional STEM-related opportunities that affect student choices and elicit their responses.

Data consist of school documents and interviews collected during 2010-2011 at each school. School documents include published 9th-12th grade course offerings, sequences, prerequisites, and strands/tracks; counseling materials; technology uses; and extracurricular options. At each school, interviews with 12 sophomore students and their parents, guidance counselor, science or math teachers, and principal focused on views of school opportunities and STEM.

Data from the documents were sorted and organized in order to create a map of STEM-related opportunities available through coursework, counseling, technology, and extracurricular activities at each school. Interviews with counselors, teachers, and the principal were entered into a qualitative analysis program and coded for STEM-related opportunities, key features, transition points, and critical junctures. The results were added to the map to elaborate it from their points of view. Interview data from focal students and parents were similarly managed and coded for STEM-related activities, responses to opportunities experienced, knowledge about future opportunities, and ideas about college. These results were overlain on the map to reveal each student’s trajectory to date and students’ and parents’ understanding of it.

In Denver, STEM-related opportunity structures vary by school, and they are heavily used by school administrators to recruit students in Denver’s open-enrollment system. But students, teachers, and parents tend to collapse the differences into college-prep and non-college prep choices. They are confused by unfamiliar course and strand labels, e.g., “Early College,” which, despite the name, is not truly a college-prep strand, and they may in consequence choose against college prep opportunities when they intend to choose them. The rigidity of some opportunity structures and school overcrowding in Denver make switching courses or strands difficult without switching schools. This creates a binary structure in practice in all the schools that works against STEM differentiation or elaboration.

Authors

• Magda Yanira Chia, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Margaret A. Eisenhart, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Michael F. Suarez, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Liliana Vazquez, University of Colorado - Boulder