Big Ol’ Group 3

Members:Bryson Macconnachie

Jonathan HarrisonKevin Bollinger

Kyle Wilson

Myth #5At the college level,

changing the STEM curriculumruns the risk of watering down

important “sink or swim” coursework.

Myths within the Myth• The mentality of needing to weed out weaker

students does not disproportionally weed out women.

• Changing the curriculum does not lead to better recruitment and retention of men and women in STEM classes.

• Mentoring will not help women choose and sustain STEM educational paths in subsequent STEM classes.

Book: The Cinderella Complex by Colette Dowling

Methods: Study done on how a women was raised would affect their confidence level. Women tend to have lower self-confidence than men. Dowling looks at why this happens psychologically from childhood. This is because parents tend to “overhelp” girls.

Conclusion related to Myth: When women get B’s they tend to think of them as inadequate grades and will drop a course, while men with C’s in the same class will continue with that same class. This could be because of women having less confidence as men.

Limitations: Older study, self confidence also depends a lot on the individual.

•Changing curriculum actually does help with retention rates. As stated before it would prevent the loss of women due to “sink or swim” concepts.

•Most students drop out of STEM classes because of the “cold” learning environment and not their ability.

•For example by having students work in pairs or teams in STEM classes they are able to learn from each other and retain information better. This would help with the retention rate of both men and women (Smith,2009).

Article: Teachers’ experiences of a single-sex initiative in a co-education school

Methods: There was a questionnaire designed to gather information in relation to teachers’ perceptions of the introduction of the process, the training available to teachers taking single-sex classes and the impact of the single-sex class approach on pupil performance and behavior. A stratified sample size of 15 teachers was then taken from those who answered the questionnaire. The issues on the questionnaire were further explored in interviews with these teachers.

Conclusions: The results suggest that single-classes per se do not improve classroom behavior, nor do they raise academic performance. Rather, it was the teachers’ attitudes and perceptions that mostly affected student behavior and performance. Limitations: This study had a small sample size and it was only conducted at Stranmillis University College in Northern Ireland.

Connections: Part of our myth is that changes in curriculum will not help students, particularly girls, better understand sink or swim coursework. This article shows that the teachers played a larger role in students understanding the material, rather than the type of class the students were in. A teacher changing their curriculum to meet the needs of their individual students and classes is more effective than single-sex classes.

"Some research indicated that in some disciplines, girls in single-sex settings benefited with respect to confidence and achievement, for example mathematics (Forgasz & Leder, 1995).

We could say that not only changing the curriculum could water down the "sink or swim" it would affect the confidence of the students cite: Forgasz, Leder, Taylor, Initials. (2007). Research versus the media: mixed or single-gender settings?. Informally published manuscript, Monash University,

Addressing the MythsThe article “Aligning the Stars" includes statements from many students who are STEM majors working on their masters and doctoral degrees, as well as some of their professors.

Everyone interviewed stated the importance of mentoring, especially peer mentoring. The goal of Fink-Vanderbilt's Bridge program is to help women and minorities achieve PhDs in STEM majors.

The statement that mentoring women in these subject areas will not help is simply false. Research shows that mentoring helps not only women, but men too. (Oguntoyinbo, 2010)

Conclusions• It maybe true that women have lower self

confidence then men which would cause them to be weeded out in sink or swim classes

• Changing the curriculum does help with retaining women in STEM classes in most cases

• Mentoring for women also helps raise the retention rate of women in STEM classes