The Disruptor

Promoting research on inclusive STEM ecosystems for faculty, students, and the greater undergraduate community. Below, you will find our latest blog entry and a complete archive of our posts. Enjoy!

Our Latest Blog

 

  • A Place Where I Can Belong: Investment in a Learning Community for Community College Transfer Students in the Marine Geosciences

    Community college students are untapped human and research capital.

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Our Archive

 

  • A Place Where I Can Belong: Investment in a Learning Community for Community College Transfer Students in the Marine Geosciences

    Community college students are untapped human and research capital.

    Learn More

  • Accelerating Progress Towards Asset-based Mathematics Teacher Preparation Through a Networked Improvement Community: It’s All About Partnerships

    Preparing secondary mathematics teachers who are committed to using asset-based pedagogical practices requires a network of partnerships among stakeholders.1 A…

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  • Addressing Systemic Issues in STEM Education: Potential and Perils of XR Technologies

    Caption: Authors Michele McColgan, Ph.D. and Jason Morphew, Ph.D. provide an overview of the MARVLS app, an augmented reality app, which helps students develop…

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  • Advancing Physics Education Where Diversity Resides: The Organization for Physics at Two-Year Colleges (OPTYCs)

    Caption: Cohort 1 of the Creating Environments that Reach Every Student Program. Participants sort ideas during a brainstorming session. St. Louis, Jan. 2025.O…

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  • An Invitation to Explore Alternative Design Features in Undergraduate Research Experiences

    Undergraduate research has long been a springboard for future scientists, but not all students can access these transformative opportunities. What if we reimag…

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  • Bringing the Field into the Classroom: Using Story Maps as an Inclusive Component of Virtual Field Experiences for Beginning Students

    Through story-mapping, students can address open-ended questions, critically evaluate existing information, and identify gaps in the current knowledge base.

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  • Building Inclusion in STEM Through Activation of Multicontext Theory

    Our journey begins with a story by co-author, Roberto Ibarra, and his discovery of a new paradigm for enhancing diversity as he analyzed his social science stu…

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  • Change Strategies and Tools to Support STEM Faculty’s Enactment of Equitable, Student-Centered Instruction

    (Caption: BETTER in STEM Cohort 1 Faculty at the Summer 2023 Workshop)IntroductionThere is a shortage of highly qualified STEM professionals in the United Stat…

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  • Characterizing Student Perspectives on Departmental Culture: The Student DELTA Survey

    Traditional Student Experience MetricsNational reports have revealed that although undergraduate education has undergone significant reform, students are not g…

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  • College as a Hero’s Journey: Faculty and Student Self-Reflection Grounds Intervention Research

    VSU Peer-mentors and mentees from Petersburg High School pose for a photo while visiting the Musem of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC (I…

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  • Community Colleges: Catalysts for Building and Diversifying the STEM Ecosystem

    Video Caption: Expanding access to our community.In the last two decades, the United States has grappled with the challenge of preparing, diversifying, and exp…

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  • Course Withdrawal Dates at Community Colleges

    Caption: Students in a Geology course work collaboratively on lab exercises. Students benefit from policies that give them every opportunity to be successful i…

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  • Creating and Maintaining Communities to Support Faculty Implementing Effective Evidence-Based Strategies

    We need to support faculty so that they persist with research-based instructional strategies, learn new techniques, and engage in reflective practice.

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  • Creating Courses that Integrate Science and Culture: Facilitating Learning Across Three Knowledge Domains

    (Caption: Image from the Florentine Codex depicting the importance and knowledge of agriculture in 16th century Aztec culture.)In this blog, a historian of sci…

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  • Culturally and Linguistically Sustaining STEM Pedagogies

    Additional Authors: John L. Pecore, Ph.D. (Professor, University of West Florida); Melissa K. Demetrikopoulos, Ph.D. (Director, Institute for Biomedical Philos…

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  • Dear STEM, It’s Time for Some Identity Work

    What identities are being built? What identities are (and/or ought) to be dismantled? What structures, traditions, philosophies, and/or practices necessitate d…

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  • Designing for Difference: Conceptualizing and Planning for Variations in Learners’ Needs, Abilities, and Interests

    Let’s leverage this moment of disruption to correct the longstanding failure of academia to recognize and plan for the inherent variability in people’s needs, …

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  • Filling the Sieve and Wondering Why We’re Still Thirsty: A Call to Humanize the STEM Workplace for Educators and Students

    Many consider the landscape of undergraduate STEM to be characterized by high rates of work stress and inequity across identities of race, ethnicity, . . .

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  • Handing Rose-Colored Glasses to STEM Faculty: Institutional Priorities in Disciplinary Identity Development

    As educators, we are setting the rules. As scientists, we can draw on our skills and training to find and use tools that both broaden participation in the scie…

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  • How a Professional Learning Program Turned Best Practices into Better Outcomes

    Improving learning in undergraduate STEM courses is a critical need to reduce high failure rates and broaden access to STEM careers. In particular, the Mathema…

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  • How Advocating for Accessibility in the Field Builds a Culture of STEM Inclusion

    Active learning in field-focused science disciplines is widely recognized as highly transformative practice in the undergraduate curriculum. Giving students ea…

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  • How Can the Underrepresentation Curriculum Increase Representation in Our Communities?

    Caption: Jalisa Ferguson, Ph.D., and Izzy Berry '22 in their James Center lab. Photos by Angelique Herring '19 and Penh Alicandro '22.Why We Need The Underrepr…

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  • How Can We Make STEM An Inclusive Space for All?

    Throughout my entire career, I have lived at the intersections of race and gender, science, and society.

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