A QuantCrit Investigation of Society’s Educational Debts Due to Racism and Sexism in Chemistry Student Learning

Dusen, Ben Van; Nissen, Jayson; Talbot, Robert M.; Huvard, Hannah; Shultz, Mollee

doi:10.1021/acs.jchemed.1c00352

Cited by 27 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 72 publications

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“…Differences or “gaps” in student performance or achievement measures between sexes and races/ethnicities have long been used to measure inequity, though there is a current movement away from the use of achievement or performance “gaps.” − Eddy et al point out that women who attend college often come in with higher measures of academic preparation, such as higher average high school GPAs, and studies that compare averages of men and women will tend to not show gender differences and studies that compare students of equal preparation do show gender differences. Inequities between sexes have been found in foundational STEM courses and specifically in chemistry courses, ,− although observed differences vary by the achievement measure used, with women often earning higher scores in other coursework , (e.g., homework, laboratory) and men earning higher scores on exams. − Further analyses have shown that differences in exam grades are affected by the contexts used to frame test questions, and the cognitive level and format of exams …”

Section: Literature Review Of Inequitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The design and implementation of more structured learning environments and the incorporation of teaching strategies that more actively engage students in the learning process seem to improve the academic performance of all students . Some studies have shown reforms can reduce inequities in college STEM courses, ,− while other investigations provided evidence that such reforms are not sufficient to create equity between sexes and all races/ethnicities. ,, …”

Section: Literature Review Of Inequitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In this study as has been done previously in other research, equity is being operationalized as equality in outcomes such as course grades. ,, From an asset-based perspective, if the strengths and assets of a group of students are valued and utilized more than others, their opportunity for success would be greater. Lack of opportunities to use one’s individual strengths and have those strengths valued leads to inequity.…”

Section: Equity and Asset-based Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Exploring Inequities in a Traditional and a Reformed General Chemistry Course

Tashiro

Talanquer

2021

J. Chem. Educ.

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Improvement in student performance from educational reforms has driven current calls for changes in curricular, instructional, and assessment practices in higher education. Less research has addressed the possibility of such reforms aiding in resolving the well-documented inequities in educational outcomes between sexes and races/ethnicities in STEM courses. In this study, we compared a traditional and a reformed general chemistry course offered at a large public research-intensive university. Using hierarchical linear and logistical modeling, we assessed and investigated the inequities between sexes and races/ethnicities in the outcomes for these courses. Initial analysis looking at aggregated data (not by sex or ethnicity) showed the benefit of reforms specifically for students that had not been as academically well prepared as others. Novel findings for off-sequence (first semester taken in Spring) classes for both the traditional and reformed courses found a female-lead in course grades and benefits for Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, American Indian or Alaska Native, Latinx or Hispanic, and African American or Black (NALA) students. The on-sequence traditional course was found to have a malelead in achievement in line with previous research. The on-sequence reformed course was found to have more equity in achievement between sexes. Possible sources of that improvement from the traditional course were investigated, and the weighting of different course components in the overall course grades was found to be a critical piece in the reformed course's more equitable outcomes. Though our results are promising in terms of offering a recommendation that may aid in advancing equity between sexes, our results indicate that the educational reforms made fell short in mitigating the pervasive racial/ethnic inequities found in achievement and performance measures.

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Section: Literature Review Of Inequitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Literature Review Of Inequitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Equity and Asset-based Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Exploring Inequities in a Traditional and a Reformed General Chemistry Course

Tashiro

Talanquer

2021

J. Chem. Educ.

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“…Van Dusen and Nissen's (2020) decisions preserved statistical power for using variance explained for model selection. In later work (e.g., Nissen et al, 2021;Van Dusen et al, 2021), we focused on respecting students' identities first and following statistical guidance for minimum group sizes second. We used a minimum group size of 20 (Simmons et al, 2011) to include social identifier variables or interactions to minimize the chance of spurious results.…”

Section: Reflections On Handling Social Identifier Datamentioning

confidence: 99%

How Statistical Model Development Can Obscure Inequities in Stem Student Outcomes

Dusen

Nissen²

2022

J Women Minor Scien Eng

Self Cite

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Researchers often frame quantitative research as objective, but every step in data collection and analysis can bias findings in often unexamined ways. In this investigation, we examined how the process of selecting variables to include in regression models (model specification) can bias findings about inequities in science and math student outcomes. We identified the four most used methods for model specification in discipline-based education research about equity: a priori, statistical significance, variance explained, and information criterion. Using a quantitative critical perspective that blends statistical theory with critical theory, we reanalyzed the data from a prior publication using each of the four methods and compared the findings from each. We concluded that using information criterion produced models that best aligned with our quantitative critical perspective's emphasis on intersectionality and models with more accurate coefficients and uncertainties. Based on these findings, we recommend researchers use information criterion for specifying models about inequities in STEM student outcomes.

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“…The shift to online examination serves as an opportunity to rethink assessment and curriculum more broadly. We want to emphasize that we disagree with deficit framing, whereby students are blamed for academic difficulties resulting from racist and sexist power structures, and we believe that the injustice of current academic systems 8 is at the root of student behaviours. Recent findings show that teaching focused on reasoning can reduce gaps in performance between marginalized groups in STEM compared with their privileged peers 9 .…”

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confidence: 95%