Lars Ulriksen

To Choose or Not to Choose Science: Constructions of Desirable Identities among Young People Considering a STEM Higher Education Programme.

In the literature, there is a general concern that a less number of students choose to study science, technology, engineering or mathematics (STEM). This paper presents results from a Danish longitudinal study which examines students’ choice of whether or not to continue studying STEM after upper-secondary school. In particular, this study focuses on students who held an STEM subject as one of their favourite subjects at secondary educational level, but who chose not to study STEM at the tertiary level. This paper explores how students’ perceptions of STEM relate to their identity work. The data used, primarily consist of interviews with 38 students at the end of upper-secondary school. The analysis explores the students’ expectations of what higher education STEM might be like. These expectations are contrasted with the first-year experiences of 18 of the 38 students who eventually entered a higher education STEM programme. The results show that the students who did not choose STEM, perceived STEM as stable, rigid and fixed, and, hence, too narrow a platform for developing and constructing desirable identities. The experiences of those students who actually entered a STEM programme turned out to be similar to these expectations. However, many choosers would also prefer their studies as less rigid and fixed. If the institutions could adjust to the form and content of the courses, it might both meet the interests of choosers and non-choosers and thereby both increase recruitment and retention at STEM higher education programmes.

The implied student

This article introduces the concept of ‘the implied student’, through which the author discusses the complex issue of the expectations of students, teachers, the institutions and the educational system, and the encounter between them. The implied student is an analytical concept, not an empirical substance. The analytical potential of the concept is suggested through a tentative analysis of a study programme in the natural sciences at a Danish university.

The First-Year Experience: Students’ Encounter with Science and Engineering Programmes

To increase the number of graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), it is not sufficient to attract more students to the programmes. It is equally important to ensure that the students complete their studies. This chapter presents a qualitative analysis of the experiences of 20 students who entered a science or engineering programme at a Danish university. In this longitudinal study, narrative interviews were carried out with the students during their first year. The chapter explores how the students were striving to bridge the gap between what they had expected the programme to be like, and what they experienced when entering. Drawing on Tinto’s model of student departure, the academic and social integration is discussed. The analysis suggests that the curriculum of the STEM programmes makes it difficult for students to become academically integrated. This is primarily because of the sequencing (when do students meet which content?), the pace, and the teaching and learning activities.

A Narrative Approach to Understand Students’ Identities and Choices

This chapter demonstrates how narrative theory in general, and narrative psychology in particular, contribute to understand how students make meaning of their choice of post-secondary studies. In particular two central ideas within the theory are unfolded; the concept of identity and the concept of time. The applicability of the theory is discussed using empirical examples. The chapter argues that a narrative approach provides an understanding of choice of study as continuous processes where individuals work on their identities in terms of negotiating and constructing a coherent choice-narrative. As a consequence future studies need to be careful when interpreting student statements about how they always wanted to study a particular subject. Narrative psychology illustrates how we need to contextualize this ‘always’ in terms of the students’ current position, cultural context and meaning making. At the end of the chapter consequences for future research are discussed as well as how this approach to students’ choices of study contributes to our understanding of students’ science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) choices.

What Makes Them Leave and Where Do They Go? Non-completion and Institutional Departures in STEM

This chapter presents the results of a quantitative analysis of national data covering Danish students who in the period 1995–2009 completed an upper-secondary school programme and entered a higher-education science, technology, engineering or mathematics (STEM) programme. The analysis focuses on identifying variables that change the hazard ratio for (1) entering a STEM programme and (2) leaving a STEM programme without completing it. Finally, the chapter explores (3) the destinations of students who leave a STEM higher-education programme. It is found that there has been no change in the relative chance of a male or female student entering a STEM programme. The results suggest that female students are more affected by achieving a high grade-point average and by the educational background of their parents than are the male students. The relative risk of non-completion is higher for women than for men, but the most important factor is GPA on entry. A disturbing result is that when student leave a STEM programme, only one third enter another STEM programme. Slightly more enter a non-STEM programme while non-STEM leavers only rarely enter a STEM programme. Non-completion in STEM higher education is a net loss of STEM graduates.

The first-year experience of non-traditional students in Danish science and engineering university programmes

To understand student drop-out from university, research must explore students’ first-year experiences and the challenges they encounter. This article analyses the first-year experiences of non-traditional students in Danish science and engineering university programmes. Focusing on identity theory and the framework of integration processes provided by Tinto, the article presents the challenges experienced by students from non-academic backgrounds and by students with ethnic minority backgrounds. The analysis presents four themes that are experienced as particularly challenging for the students: (1) a strong career focus which is hard for the students to maintain in their transition into university; (2) how the students from some non-academic backgrounds encounter the challenges they meet with limited resources; (3) how they spend time and resources on their family and how this affects their integration in the programme; and (4) the process of academic and social integration are particularly challenging as they require students to submit themselves to the cultural expectations of their studies, which can be hard to understand for students from families with no prior experiences of academia. The article discusses how these experiences can be understood within an identity framework.

Why Do Students in STEM Higher Education Programmes Drop/Opt Out? – Explanations Offered from Research

This chapter takes it point of departure in a discussion of the current literature on student drop/opt out within science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) (This chapter is based on a section of Ulriksen L, Madsen LM, Holmegaard HT, Stud Sci Educ 46(2):209–244, 2010). It outlines Tinto’s model of understanding retention in general within higher education and it discusses the critique of the model. Tinto’s model approaches students’ meeting with higher education as an integration process involving both academic and social aspects of university life. Further, the chapter presents the ideas of Seymour and Hewitt. They reject the idea that students’ drop out/opt out should be understood as a problem within the student. Instead, they address it as a relation between the institutions and the students. The chapter argues how the concept of identity can be a way forward to understand this relation, and provides a short overview of the current research on identity and student persistence in STEM. Research focusing on identities has in recent years become a subfield in the study of students continuing with or leaving STEM programmes. Finally the chapter concludes by discussing the implications of these findings for further research.

Being a Woman in a Man’s Place or Being a Man in a Woman’s Place: Insights into Students’ Experiences of Science and Engineering at University

This chapter presents a study carried out in three Danish higher education study programmes within science, technology, engineering or mathematics (STEM), each with a heavy imbalance in students’ biological sex. In Denmark few female students apply for computer science and physics with nanotechnology while few male students apply for molecular biomedicine. The study explores how students of the minority biological sex attain recognition within the study programme and how they negotiate their identities to gain a sense of belonging. The results show how both male and female students, being the minority in their study programme, need to engage in narrow gendered identity negotiation-processes to belong and become socially and academically integrated into their new study programme. We show how female students need to position themselves as non-feminine and strive to become ‘one of the boys’ whereas male students are restricted to positioning a certain kind of masculinity to become recognized. There is more room for doing gender within computer science for the female students than within physics and nanotechnology. The male students within molecular biomedicine are expected to position themselves as something different from the girls. Their negotiation strategy to get integrated into their study programme could be labelled as ‘segregation’. The implications of these results are discussed.

Understanding Student Participation and Choice in Science and Technology Education: The Contribution of IRIS

Many of the chapters in this volume provide reviews of the existing research literature. In this chapter we focus on what the research studies presented in this book have contributed to our understanding of students’ educational choices. The nature of these contributions is varied. Many findings corroborate existing research insights, or explore existing perspectives in new educational contexts or across distinct geographical and cultural settings. In some cases our work challenges prevalent accounts of students’ educational choices. This chapter has five themes: theoretical perspectives; choice as a continuous process; the role of identity and social structure; gender; and methodological insights. We end with suggestions for the future development of research into student participation and choice

Why Should European Higher Education Care about the Retention of Non-Traditional Students?.

Equal access to higher education has for long been a political ambition, however, despite the expansion of the number of students now entering higher education it has not yet been achieved. The present special issue offers insights into the encounter between students from non-traditional backgrounds and higher education. Five individual studies from four countries offer a unique contribution to understand non-traditional students’ risk of dropping out of higher education as more than a question of academic preparation and hence individual deficits. Together the five papers display a variety of analyses of a key issue for the European Higher Education Area: attracting and retaining a wider group of students. The results show how non-traditional students across countries are made up of a complex mosaic of voices. Hence, the special issue makes a call to move away from the stereotypical images of non-traditional students, and to continue analysing the variety, the complexity and diversity of non-traditional students and their encounter with higher education.