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A team of Kent State educators and scientists are undertaking a research study to broaden participation in STEM through a method known as cascading peer-mentorship. Cascading peer mentorship facilitates the transfer of knowledge and experience from senior participants (computer science researchers and college students) to junior members (high school students and then to middle school and elementary students).

This approach transforms junior members from passive recipients into active participants by allowing them to mentor younger students while creating opportunities for participants to experience reciprocal mentoring and develop an understanding of what it means to teach or mentor somebody else in STEM. A cascading peer-mentoring pedagogy can change the way computer science content is being taught leading to an increased interest in computer science and diversity of student population.

A research-practice collaboration between EHHS, Kent State’s Advanced Telerobotics Research Lab, and the Cleveland Metropolitan School District, the project was awarded a four-year, $1.7 million grant from the National Science Foundation. The grant will serve as a catalyst for further innovation, research, and educational advancement at Kent State.

Professors Elena Novak and Lisa Borgerding in the School of Teaching, Learning and Curriculum Studies, are partnering with Jong-Hoon Kim, Ph.D., Director of Advanced Telerobotics Research (ATR) Lab, and Ji-Ann Li, Ph.D., from the School of Foundations, Leadership and Administration to design, field test, support teachers with computer science and science professional development, and evaluate a cascading peer-mentoring model that connects high school, middle, and elementary school students as well as their science and computer science teachers with the ATR Lab through a Physical Science Robotics Interdisciplinary Design (PRIDe) curriculum.      

The project investigates how an innovative, cascading peer-mentorship approach can improve current practices in K-12 computer science education. It also provides students with interdisciplinary learning experiences in physical science, robotics, and design challenges related to robotics engineering, while the cascading peer-mentoring model targets the key factors that contribute to a lack of interest in computer science, including:

• relatable role models,
• sense of belongingness,
• self-efficacy, and,
• early computer science education.

“We need to create and implement a cascading mentorship ladder in formal educational settings that connects K-12 students with a university computer science research lab using standards-based K-12 curricula,” said Novak. “To address this critical need, this project will create and implement a cascading mentorship ladder in formal educational settings that connects more than 650 economically disadvantaged students from a predominately black and Hispanic school district, along with their computer science and science teachers, with a university computer science research lab.”

The PRIDe curriculum, embedded with the cascading peer-mentoring model, strives to create multiple pathways that encourage students with different interests to connect to, and communicate about, science and robotics by:

• combining physical science engineering design challenges with robotics,
• encouraging storytelling and creativity within robotics,
• including mentoring and socializing experiences, and,
• organizing robotics exhibitions.

A design-based research approach will be used to field test the PRIDe curriculum with cascading mentoring to find out what works and what doesn’t, and to improve it in an informed way that measures its impact on students.

A mixed methods experimental intervention design that employs quantitative and qualitative data will be used to investigate how the PRIDe curriculum – with and without cascading peer-mentorship – influences participating students’ attitudes and learning of computer science and physical science. In addition, the research explores students’ cascading peer-mentorship experiences and engagement in computer science using a mixed methods approach that leverages surveys, focus group interviews, classroom observations, and school metric data.

The project will contribute to the research on K-12 computer science education by developing a prototype of a cascading peer-mentoring model, field testing it in classrooms, and examining its impact on participants. Moreover, the project will contribute to the research on educational robotics by examining the sociocultural dimensions of computing and connecting robotics with science through critical social issues of energy and sustainability using an affordable, custom-developed robot.