United States

COVID-19 has disrupted nearly all aspects of global society, with severe impacts on many people around the world. In 2020, supported by [funding source], we began a study to document and understand how COVID-19 has affected graduate admissions in physics, with a focus on the ways in which students and departments have been impacted. In this Work in Progress paper, we report on the first year of this study, which collected data from the 2019-2020 admissions cycle. We collected survey data from Directors of Graduate Study (DGS) and from students who applied to physics graduate school in this cycle (including students who did and did not begin graduate school in 2020), as well as conducted follow-up interviews with students and faculty to better understand the breadth of experiences of individuals affected. Four themes emerged from this first year of data: shifts in international/domestic representation, program resilience as a key distinguishing feature during COVID, the breadth of student experiences in 2020, and concerns about the expectations for the future.

PERC SM 21

Tracking Graduate Admissions During COVID-19: Year One

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graduate

covid-19

**Making Physics More Inclusive and Eliminating Exclusionary Practices in Physics**

As a gateway discipline to STEM majors and careers, physics plays a central role in deciding who does, and who doesn't, get to discover and pursue scientific careers. Technical and scientific professionals are rewarded with economic privilege and status which affords them both social and cultural power. Therefore, social justice will be realized only when the opportunity, and the choice, to excel in physics is open to all students. The culture and practices of the physics classroom reflect the culture of physics at large, which raises the question of how our professional physics communities can embrace, rather than inadvertently repel, a diverse group of academics that can help improve physics culture.  To this end, the 2021 Physics Education Research Conference will focus on defining inclusive spaces and practices. Additionally, we will explore strategies for eliminating exclusionary practices in our classrooms, research spaces, and professional organizations. We call on the community to propose sessions that will drive conversations related to these initiatives throughout PERC 2021.

Please download the full program [here. ](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1TRMC_SYJ3PUqXyP7sskA7LRSA8ow0eRE/view?usp=sharing)

August 4, 2021 - August 5, 2021 in a Virtual Conference Format

Making Physics More Inclusive and Eliminating Exclusionary Practices in Physics

poster

Informal physics programs can play a vital role in supporting student learning and sense of community beyond the formal settings of a classroom or laboratory. This work builds on a recent study of the impact of facilitating informal physics programs on students' physics identity, sense of belonging, and career skills development by narrowing the focus to specifically examine effects on female students who are underrepresented in physics. We found a significant shift in confidence of choice of major when compared prior to and after facilitating informal physics programs. All female students who were interviewed discussed a positive effect of participating in informal programs on their interest and motivation with regards to the field of physics and the development of characteristics indicative of a growth mindset.

Impact of informal physics programs on female university students

Disability is an often-overlooked aspect of diversity. Recent research has indicated that there are barriers to access and participation for disabled students inherent in the design of physics courses. To help counteract these barriers, universities are required to provide reasonable accommodations for disabled students. However, not all students use the accommodations they have access to because of social factors (e.g., disability stigma), and others do not have access to the professional diagnosis often required to access accommodations. The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences of students who identify with a disability/impairment who were taking an emergency remote teaching (ERT) physics course in Fall 2020 to inform policies about providing access to students in future remote and face-to-face courses. In this paper, we present the prevalence and types of impairments disabled students in physics courses reported, their reported accommodation usage, and ethical considerations of this work. Overall, we find that disabled students represent a sizeable group in physics courses, and there are positive and negative reasons students did not use or request accommodations.

Students’ use of disability accommodations in emergency remote teaching

Physics is perceived to have a “culture” of exclusion, which includes not embracing individuals from certain demographics who are underrepresented in the field. Many who are from underrepresented groups have stated they feel impacted by cultural pressures to assimilate to what is traditionally considered a “physics person.” In order to better understand these cultural pressures, this study examines statements from two physics teachers who participated in a summer professional development (PD) workshop. During the summer PD, the two teachers participated in sessions where they made statements that described how physics culture impacted their identity and understanding of equity, which ultimately shaped their approach towards teaching. Analysis of teachers’ statements showed that physics culture impacted the teachers' views on instruction in the areas of inclusivity and shaping students' physics identity. This study has implications for research on the role of physics culture and how it impacts underrepresented students’ and teachers' identity and approach to equity.

The Role of Physics Culture in Shaping In-Service Physics Teacher Identities and Framings of Equity: Two Case Studies

We surveyed educators and college students on their perceptions of a set of physics simulations with and without non-speech auditory display. In this work, we analyzed responses to a single open-ended text prompt from the surveys and found themes related to multimodality and inclusion. In their consideration of the auditory display, some educators and students noted the complementary interplay of the auditory and visual displays, while others noted that the auditory display can serve to augment the primary modality of the visual display. Educators also identified specific groups of learners that could potentially benefit or be negatively impacted by the auditory display, including older learners, younger learners, those with certain "learning styles", and learners with sensory disabilities. This work is part of a larger effort to expand the auditory display of physics simulations to advance inclusive learning tools, and to investigate educator and student use and perceptions of multimodal physics simulations.

Multimodality and inclusion: Educator perceptions of physics simulation auditory display

Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) has been the subject of a growing body of psychological and recently, neurological research. The majority of this research has been behavioral and deficit-oriented, focused on “coping” and ways of controlling ADHD behavior to function within institutional norms. This focus persists despite compelling evidence that physiological variations are responsible for ADHD behavior, over which “control” is limited and institutional “functionality” becomes discriminatory. This is evidenced by the lack of scientific works examining ADHD from a positive perspective. In this study, we analyze interviews of STEM students and faculty at Texas State University (a large Hispanic-Serving Institution) who have been diagnosed with ADHD. These interviews will explore learner variability based on interviewees’ experiences in STEM fields, and their perceptions of personal strengths that may be unique to their variant neurobiology and/or their life experience as members of a marginalized academic group.

Exploring learner variability and disability identity in STEM students with ADHD

In this project we investigated the potential disparities in learning outcomes for all students in North Carolina high school physics classrooms by administering the Force Concept Inventory (FCI), with an appended demographic survey, to ~1500 first semester, introductory college physics students at three North Carolina universities prior to instruction. In this manner, we were able collect sufficient data to investigate disparities in scores on the concept survey by gender, race, highest level of high school physics taken, as well as socioeconomic and geographic variables to be investigated in further study. Our analysis suggests that there may be conditions within North Carolina high school physics classrooms that lead to inequitable learning outcomes among students of differing identities. In this presentation, we will only focus on gender and race.

Inequity in North Carolina High School Physics Outcomes: Gender and Race

Using analysis of variance on a sample consisting of 1,499 US students across 21 US PhD programs, we show that there is no significant difference in the time it takes US male and female physics PhD students to complete their degree programs. This result comes in spite of a statistically significant 18 percentile point gap in median GRE-P scores between genders. Additional analyses reveal that there is no statistical difference between US students reported as White, Black/Hispanic/Multiracial/Native American, and Asian. Expanding our sample to also include 1,143 Non-US students, we find a small but significant effect of citizenship status on time to PhD completion where the average time for Non-US students to complete a physics PhD is about two months less than their US student counterparts. These results show that in spite of known gaps in standardized admissions exams between genders, these differences are not reflected in subsequent graduate school performance. Our findings reinforce the need for graduate admissions committees to go beyond quantitative metrics and conduct a holistic assessment of an applicant's potential to perform research effectively and to earn a PhD.

Time to PhD completion is no different between men and women despite score gap on physics GRE

Postsecondary STEM instruction often does not meet the diverse needs, abilities, and interests of postsecondary STEM learners. The Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework provides ideas for designing instructional environments to support learner variation. However, existing tools do not meet the professional development needs of many postsecondary STEM instructors, or the research needs of some discipline-based education researchers. Enacting and assessing UDL in postsecondary STEM requires expertise form three stakeholder groups: postsecondary STEM instructors, experts in disability and UDL, and discipline-based education researchers. Building on prior work with UDL in postsecondary STEM, our multi-disciplinary team developed the Universal Design for Learning Instructional Practice Observation Protocol (UDL-IPOP). The UDL-IPOP has one-to-one alignment with the finest-grain descriptors (i.e., checkpoints) in the UDL framework as well as exemplar practices to explicate UDL-aligned instructional practices for postsecondary STEM. After drafting an initial version of the UDL-IPOP, we discussed it with representatives from the three relevant stakeholder groups. Here, we describe practices that aligned with the UDL framework. Then, we discuss initial impressions about which practices postsecondary STEM instructors likely already implement and ideas from disability experts about how STEM instructors could deepen their UDL practice. Overall, we find that postsecondary STEM instructors and disability experts focused on different types of learner variation. We suggest that collaborating with disability experts could provide a necessary “lens change” to better support variation in postsecondary STEM learners’ needs, abilities, and interests.

Explicating Universal Design for Learning-aligned instructional practices for postsecondary STEM

In the spring and summer of 2020, we collected data on faculty experiences during their transition to onlineteaching as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Data on the participants’ institutions, job security and position,and preparation time were collected, as well as a free text response to add anything the participants felt wasrelevant. In total 364 text responses were collected. Using natural language processing tools, sentiment scoreswere calculated for each response. The sentiment was found to be overall positive. Then, a machine learningmodel was created using Keras, which was trained on various data for 75% of the responses. The remaining25% were used for predicting sentiment scores, to identify which data from the survey, if any, were potentialpredictors of participant sentiment. The score predictions were used to determine if any data on participantsâinstitutions, positions, or transition time were correlated with positive or negative experiences.

Predictors of faculty sentiment on their transition to online teaching

Due to the growing concerns surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, colleges and universities either canceled or remotely hosted their 2020 National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) programs. This study is part of a larger study examining the impact of these fully remote experiences on professional and psychosocial factors such as mentees’ sense of belonging, identity, and self-efficacy and their retention in STEM degree programs. We present a single-student case study and describe the dramaturgical analysis which centers on identifying five fundamental constructs within the data: objectives, conflicts, tactics, attitudes, and emotions. These items investigate what the participant in the remote REU program experienced, and how this experience changed the ways in which he thinks about his future career decision-making. Our analysis explored four different themes: Lack of community, mentor support, real REU experience in a virtual format, and future career decision-making. The mentee reported that this experience was highly beneficial and that he developed a sense of belonging and identity, despite working remotely – often from his own bedroom.

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