2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

This paper reports on a year-long faculty professional development program for STEM faculty teaching at a northeast community college and for area high school science and mathematics teachers. The program focused on culturally responsive and inclusive teaching practices and consisted of a 3-week virtual summer institute and mentoring on use of inclusive practices during the academic year that followed. Our research questions were: Does participation impact faculty beliefs and self-efficacy in using such practices? Do students who take classes with faculty trained in culturally responsive and inclusive practices show higher levels of academic achievement in STEM?
Data was collected from faculty participants using a survey at three timepoints that measured self-efficacy and awareness of using cultural culturally responsive pedagogy. Institutional research provided a comparison of student academic achievement in college STEM courses taught by participants vs. nonparticipants.
A total of 18 college and 10 high school faculty participants took part in the first two Institutes. Results in this report include data collected 1-3 terms post-Institute from the first two cohorts of college faculty participants. Findings show faculty confidence was sustained between the end of the summer institute and the end of the follow-on semesters. Preliminary student evidence showed a higher rate of achievement of Black and Latinx students in STEM course sections taught by participants from Cohort 1 compared to sections taught by non-participants. That is, the percentage of Black and Latinx students achieving a grade of C- or higher in STEM courses taught by cohort 1 faculty participants was higher post-institute. In all other (non-participant) college STEM courses during this same timeframe, the percentage of students achieving a grade of C- or higher remained largely unchanged.