Equity & Inclusion Framework in STEM

While the Million Girls Moonshot Initiative’s goal is focused on increasing the number of girls with an engineering mindset and a STEM identity— the Initiative will benefit all students, improving the overall quality of all afterschool STEM opportunities and lifting up both boys and girls as they become future innovators. As STEM system builders we work to increase access to STEM learning opportunities in afterschool and summer learning programs.  Additionally, we need to explore how to support programs to engage and nurture all young people’s interest in STEM learning.  We need to address how programs are designing and implementing programming to broaden participation in STEM for learners in poverty, learners of color, learners in rural areas, and girls in STEM. Working with national experts, STEMNext has developed an Equity and Inclusion Framework that we hope will be a useful guide for supporting programs in this transformation. A framework is a way to illustrate the particular concepts and variables that are connected to a specific issue (e.g. Equity and Inclusion). It can serve as a map, illustrating connections, and a way of identifying strategies and actions for addressing the specific issue(s)

​

---

---

Helpful Resources

• Toolkit: Broadening Perspectives in Broadening Participation in STEM toolkit, developed by CAISE - To help informal STEM education and science communication groups reflect on and strengthen their efforts to broaden participation in STEM, CAISE’s Broadening Participation in STEM Task Force has developed a suite of professional development tools. If you are a staff leader or trainer working on broadening participation, these resources can help support your work. You can use them to plan and lead reflective discussions about current practices, with an eye to developing goals, strategies, and priorities that can make your ISE and science communication work more inclusive.
  
  • BP-Conversation-Guide.pdf (informalscience.org) - A guide for leading discussions in your organization or program focused on broadening participation. 
    
  • BP-4-Cultural-Norms.pdf (informalscience.org) - A practice brief to help organizations and programs reflect on the cultural norms of STEM they do/do not reinforce.
    
• Article: Creating Pathways for Equity in STEM Through Family Engagement - Highlighting the experiences of hispanic/latine youths in STEM
  
• Article: Exploring STEM Engagement in Girls in Rural Communities - Creating enriching and encouraging programs to engage girls in STEM is critical because girls and women bring unique experiences, perspectives, and ideas to scientific work. Besides benefiting the women themselves, having more women in STEM occupations will enable society to benefit from women’s expertise by maximizing innovation, creativity, and competitiveness.