Introductory courses have a greater negative impact on the chances of minority students completing a ... [+]
Introductory STEM courses are more likely to deter minority students from completing a STEM degree than their white classmates.
Courses designed to help students decide if a STEM degree is for them have a disproportionate impact on groups already underrepresented in the field, according to a new study.
And far from helping provide a level playing field, researchers suggest that such courses may actually make existing disparities worse.
Minority students are already underrepresented in STEM education. Despite comprising around 30% of the U.S. population, and 34% of students planning to pursue STEM subjects at college, Black, Hispanic and Indigenous students earn around 23% of all STEM degrees.
Introductory courses, such as calculus or general chemistry, are designed to serve as a gateway to a discipline, helping to recruit students and supporting success and retention.
But instead of a gateway, then can act as a barrier for minority students, according to researchers at Pennsylvania State University, who analyzed records of more than 100,000 students from six large public universities.
After controlling for high school preparation and intention to study a STEM subject, researchers found that white male students were more likely to go on to obtain an undergraduate STEM degree after completing an introductory course than both women and minority students.
Almost half - 48% - of white male students who got a C grade or above in all their introductory courses went onto get a bachelor’s STEM degree, compared with 40% of Black, Hispanic and Indigenous male students with similar grades and 35 % of female minority students.
For Black students specifically, the probability of obtaining a STEM degree with similar grades is even lower, at 31% for men and 28% for women, according to the study, published in the journal PNAS Nexus.
Low grades on an introductory course translate into a decreased probability of completing a STEM degree, but this effect is more pronounced for minority students, with the disparities actually increasing
White male students who get lower than a grade C in an introductory course still have a 33% chance of ending up with a STEM degree, around double the rate for Black students, at 16% for men and 15% for women.
The findings may point to flaws in the design of introductory STEM courses, according to Nathanial Brown, mathematics professor at Pennsylvania State and lead author of the study.
“Underrepresented STEM students experience greater negative impacts on graduating from low intro course grades than their White, male peers, even after controlling for academic preparation in high school and intent to study STEM,” Prof Brown said.
“Introductory STEM courses are institutional structures that may exacerbate disparities in STEM education and, as such, equity issues must be central in efforts to redesign and rebuild them.”
The findings have implications for the diversity of STEM professions as well as the range of research in STEM fields, he added.
Black and Hispanic workers are underrepresented in STEM fields, according to a recent report from the Pew Research Center, making up 27% of all employees but just 17% of the STEM workforce.
Current undergraduate trends unlikely to substantially narrow the gap, representing a loss of talent that could hinder economic growth and hamper global competitiveness.
