Towards a Model of Systemic Change in University STEM Education

TL;DR

This paper proposes a holistic model for systemic change in university STEM education by integrating organizational, departmental, and individual change strategies to foster large-scale cultural transformation.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive framework combining multiple change models to address the challenges of large-scale STEM educational reform.

Findings

Holistic change models can effectively support cultural transformation in STEM departments.

Integrating multiple perspectives enhances the likelihood of successful systemic reform.

Case studies demonstrate the application of the model in two departments.

Abstract

Despite numerous calls for the transformation of undergraduate STEM education, there is still a lack of successful models for creating large-scale, systemic cultural changes in STEM departments. To date, change efforts have generally focused on one of three areas: developing reflective teachers, disseminating curricula and pedagogy, or enacting institutional policy. These efforts illustrate many of the challenges of departmental change; in particular, they highlight the need for a holistic approach that integrates across all three of these levels: individual faculty, whole departments, and university policymakers. To address these challenges, as part of our campus-wide AAU-sponsored effort in STEM education transformation, we import and integrate models of change from multiple perspectives. We draw from models in organizational change, from departmental and disciplinary change in STEM education, and from efforts to support individual efforts such as the development and dissemination model. As a result, our departmental cultural change efforts are an attempt at holistic reform. We will discuss our theoretical underpinnings and ground this theory in a sample of approaches in two departments.