Available literature partially touches on the role of individual faculty sponsors and recommendation letters in admissions, but does not fully establish significant influence by individual professors over graduate admissions committee decisions.
This study reviews literature on racially equitable admissions practices relevant to graduate programs in STEM. Graduate Record Exam (GRE) scores correlate more strongly with race, gender, and socioeconomic status than performance metrics for research during or after graduate school. Structural changes to admissions processes that can improve equity of admissions decisions and reduce correlations between admissions decisions and demographic data include using holistic review or composite scores that quantize more components of an application, removing hard limits on course requirements, admitting students as a cohort instead of to individual faculty sponsors, and diversifying admissions committees. Some alternative scoring methods attempt to measure personality traits, but performing these measurements during admissions may present difficulties. Bridge programs—whether they are implemented as collaborations with a minority-serving institution, a personalized educational program for each student admitted to a program, or a stand-alone program before the doctoral degree program—may be able to improve both recruitment and retention of students with underrepresented racial and ethnic identities in their field of study. Finally, financial barriers to applications can disproportionately affect underrepresented applicants due to systemic racism. We end with recommendations for graduate programs to improve equity in admissions processes.
... applicant pool . Bias in admission decisions is not limited to heavily relying on GRE scores but also on undergraduate GPA , access to research opportunities , and recommendation letters ( Woo et al . , 2023 ; Roberts et al . , 2021 ) ...
This open access book provides a review of research studies, theoretical and conceptual frameworks, methodology, and results in discipline-based Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education research (DBER). It includes frameworks that examine the engagement of diverse learners, and that desettle and disrupt existing norms of STEM and STEM education. It showcases a collection of works from diverse scholars engaged in DBER scholarship and practice, and aims to transform postsecondary STEM teaching and learning. Through these, this book guides in the building of practices that foster the expansion and diversification of postsecondary STEM education, and STEM career advancement.
Adams is a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair of Creativity and Science, and Associate Professor at The University of Calgary, Canada, where she holds a dual appointment in the Department of Chemistry and Werklund School of Education. Her research focuses on the intersection between creativity and science teaching and learning in postsecondary contexts. More specifically, she examines challenges to diversity in science in Canada and the United States, and how this impedes scientific creativity and innovation. She has scholarly expertise in science teaching and learning in informal science contexts, including museums, national parks and everyday settings.
Jennifer's scholarship also includes youth learning and identity in informal science contexts, with a focus on underrepresented youth and place/identity in transnational communities and environmental education. Her work emphasizes critical and sociocultural frameworks and participatory, qualitative, poststructural approaches. Prior to her appointment at the University of Calgary, she was at Brooklyn College and The Graduate Center, City University of New York, United States. She has also worked as a teacher and researcher in New York City public schools, and at the American Museum of Natural History. Geraldine L. Cochran is an Associate Professor of Physics at The Ohio State University.
Cochran is a Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) and a Fellow of the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT). Cochran has extensive experience conducting equity-oriented physics education research that spans multiple levels of physics education including high school curricula, introductory collegiate level curricula, assessment in graduate education, and mentorship within the physics workforce. Cochran also investigates the experiences of marginalized people at various points in the academic pathway in physics, and interventions and programs aimed at making physics more equitable.
Cochran is the Principal Investigator of the Transforming Introductory Physics Sequences to Support all Students (TIPSSS) project. TIPSSS is a network of instructors and researchers committed to transforming physics courses to support students' success regardless of their math participation. Jennifer D. Adams is a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair of Creativity and Science, and Associate Professor at The University of Calgary, Canada, where she holds a dual appointment in the Department of Chemistry and Werklund School of Education. Her research focuses on the intersection between creativ...
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