Resumen de The STEMentors Program: Promoting the Academic Readiness and Community Building of Students within General Chemistry
Dory DeWeese, Jocelyn Elizabeth Nardo, Isaac Applebaum, Sameer Sundrani, Amir Zur, Robert M. Waymouth, Jennifer Schwartz Poehlmann, Shima Salehi
The retention disparities in undergraduate degree attainment are a persistent problem within the United States, especially for Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC), first-generation and low-income students, and women (referred to as marginalized groups in STEM [MGS] hereafter) pursuing STEM degrees. The following exploratory article illustrates how a program called STEMentors based in the Department of Chemistry has led to positive outcomes for MGS students taking general chemistry in 2021–2022. The goal of the article is to highlight how this program serves as an example for other universities to create and implement a similar model to support MGS students. The STEMentors program is a supplemental instruction opportunity aimed to mentor MGS students to further support them with the academic skills, study strategies, and content knowledge needed to be successful in first-year chemistry through a peer-led tutoring learning model. Qualitatively, the program draws from aggregated postsurvey data (N = 50) and student interview data (N = 5) to elucidate how students perceived their academic readiness and community building as a function of belonging. Implications suggest supplemental instruction programs like STEMentors are effective in helping students improve their belonging as a function of academic readiness and community building. Thus, continued research should work toward developing similar supplemental instruction programs across STEM courses.
