Joi Lynn Mondisa

Social Community: A Mechanism to Explain the Success of STEM Minority Mentoring Programs

Social community may be a mechanism that explains the success of minority mentoring programs. We define a social community as an environment where like-minded individuals engage in dynamic, multidirectional interactions that facilitate social support. In this conceptual article, we propose a social community model for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics minority mentoring programs to understand how a community’s program values, resources, and activities play a role in the learning and enrichment of its members. Using a social exchange lens, we: (a) define social community relative to minority mentoring programs, (b) examine how program elements facilitate social community, and (c) discuss participant outcomes beyond programmatic outcomes. A summary of our continuing research, preliminary findings, and future research recommendations are also detailed.

Work in progress: In their own words — How “changemakers” talk about change

We present preliminary work on “change knowledge” through a study investigating what exemplar “changemakers” understand about the process of undergraduate STEM education transformation.

The role of social community and individual differences in minority mentoring programs

Abstract Researchers have examined various outcomes of undergraduate minority mentoring programs. However, there is a significant gap in research about how program members with different demographic backgrounds may not have the same experiences or outcomes as other members despite being subject to the same program elements. To address these gaps, we employed a social community framework to examine the differences across the perceptions of connectedness to a social community and participant outcomes of members of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) Merit Program (MP) for Emerging Scholars. An ANOVA was performed for a study sample of n = 179 current and past MP participants. Results indicated a need to: (a) find ways to translate experiences to lower performing groups, (b) identify other approaches to build resilience and encourage connections and engagement in communities of practice, and (c) explicitly educate all participants in the importance of social community in their professional development.

The University of Michigan's M-STEM academies program: Examining the social community of future engineers

A social community framework is used to examine the program elements of the University of Michigans (UM) M-Engin Program, an undergraduate engineering mentoring program, to provide insights about its social community elements. At this initial research stage, a methodical analysis of the program data (e.g., analytics, features, elements, and artifacts) was performed to create a portfolio to begin to understand the role of social community within the M-Engin Program. From this research, we can learn how to better serve members of various program communities by identifying opportunities for improvement. Future research will include conducting informal interviews with the programs coordinators and surveying and interviewing program participants.

Work in progress: A case study of the types and frequencies of conflict in engineering design dyads

Conflict is a common subject of research on engineering teams. While some conflict may improve team creativity and productivity, it can also detract from team member satisfaction, perceived team efficacy, and overall team performance. In this paper, we present a preliminary framework for identifying conflict within engineering design dyads using a case study approach. Using this framework, we identified instances of conflict in one male-male and one female-male engineering dyad performing a brief engineering design task. We identified more instances of conflict in the male-male dyad than the female-male dyad; however, this conflict appeared to be productive. An implication of this research for educators is to encourage argumentation within the teamwork occurring in their classroom. Students should understand that conflict can be constructive and improve their teams ability to move iteratively through the design process.