Written evidence submitted by Dr Pallavi Banerjee (COM101)

Impact assessment of STEM initiatives in improving educational outcomes, increasing and widening participation

Executive summary

 

  1. I am employed as a Research Associate at Durham University in the school of applied social sciences. My research interests are in the area of education effectiveness, improvement and policy making. I completed a PhD at the School of Education, Durham University. For the PhD I evaluated the impact of taking part in STEM enrichment and enhancement activities on educational outcomes of participating pupils. The study followed up the learning trajectories of 80,000 intervention pupils across state maintained English secondary schools from the beginning of key stage 3 till the end of key stage 5. The research findings from this study can help form the evidence base for policy and practice. I am writing to draw the attention of the Parliament to research informed factual information from which the committee might be able to draw conclusions. I also make some recommendations for action by the Government and others which I would request the committee to consider.

 

  1. The STEM informal education sector supports a very important cause. It tries to bridge the gap between science, technology, engineering and mathematics as done in classrooms to the real world. It introduces young people to the fascinating world of science and maths through various activities which could not have been done in the classroom or through the curriculum. All of these work for improving trends in attitudes towards STEM subjects and careers. These schemes call for huge investment of resources in terms of money, time and manpower. My research shows they have not had a noticeable effect on improving measurable educational outcomes of participating children.

 

  1. Increasing and widening participation in STEM learning trajectories has long been a priority education policy in the UK as in other developed countries. My research investigated the impact of one such policy initiative being run in the United Kingdom for more than a decade now funded by government, private organisations and educational charities. This scheme fit into the category of informal education described in POSTNOTE (Number 382 June 2011) and are called STEM enrichment and enhancement activities. They are administered across primary and secondary schools in the form of hands-on practical activities, ambassador visits, outreach programmes, after school clubs, day trips to state-of-the-art laboratories. Higher education institutions, private organisations and other activity providers all contribute to these programmes. A list of such currently active programmes for specific age groups can be found under the online STEM directories.

 

  1. For the evaluation I looked at all 11-16 year olds from state maintained secondary schools in England using the National Pupil Database. I analyse if children who participated in these activities from the beginning of year 7 till they took GCSEs did any better than the national average. The main educational outcomes considered in this study were GCSE results of participating schools, GCSE results of all participating pupils, GCSE results of disadvantaged pupils (lower socioeconomic classes and ethnic minorities) and subject choices made by participating pupils in AS/A levels. Results show school or pupils GCSE attainment in science and mathematics and post-16 continued STEM participation in STEM learning trajectories is not affected by a pupil’s engagement in these activities. Disadvantaged students such as those eligible for free school meals and the black ethnic minorities are both known to perform not so well in these subjects as their peers. Research findings show engagement in these activities did not improve their GCSE science or maths attainment nor did it increase the likelihood of these young people wanting to pursue STEM trajectories at AS/A levels.
  2. These STEM enrichment and enhancement activities are an extended form of communication strategies to encourage young people to study STEM subjects in higher and further education, and to encourage them to take up STEM careers. Results summarised here are good predictors of the likelihood of STEM skilled experts in the future population of England. Given the concerns expressed by the Lords Select committee over the insufficient number of young people several schemes were introduced as policy measures to increase STEM engagement. However, as government reports show there have not been many robust evaluations so far for impact assessment. This is important for accountability to understand if the schemes are working. Are there any social groups which benefit from such schemes?

 

  1. Yet another research project conducted at Durham on transition age pupils to see if engagement in these activities altered their attitudes towards science and mathematics and even in terms of the future subject or career choices they would like to make. A group of students participated in STEM activities for a year while the other did not. Survey responses, administered at the beginning and end of the year, were largely similar. Research findings show their intentions to study or not science/maths later on or attitudes towards these subjects in their classrooms did not change irrespective of their engagement in STEM schemes. What mattered more was if the parents of these children wanted them to make STEM subject or career choices. Thus parental involvement was a bigger predictor of STEM engagement than STEM enrichment and enhancement activities.
  2. Recommendations for action by the Government or others which I would request the committee to consider - We do not know if any of these activities currently being run across schools in the UK are more effective than the others. This kind of information is very crucial for two reasons, a) to be able to build on the best ones for the same or reduced amount of money b) given the plethora of activities available for head teachers to choose from. Often it is possible that these kind of activities arouse a general interest in science and maths subjects in the society a direct effect of which cannot be immediately seen in the form of improved attainment of increased take up of these subjects in secondary schools. Further research is required to look into these implications. Attainment and participation are arguably only two of the several aspects which are impacted by education, but definitely very important ones. As educational research shows children are likely to continue studying subjects in which they score higher.

 

References:

Banerjee, P.A (2017). Does continued participation in STEM enrichment and enhancement activities affect school maths attainment? Oxford Review of Education 43(1).

Banerjee, P.A. (2016). A longitudinal evaluation of the impact of STEM enrichment and enhancement activities in improving educational outcomes. International Journal of Educational Research 76(1): 1-11.

Banerjee, P.A. (2016). A systematic review of factors linked to poor academic performance of disadvantaged students in science and maths in schools. Cogent Education 3: 1178441.

Banerjee, P.A. (2015). Can schemes to inspire tomorrow's scientists close the poverty attainment gap? The Conversation

May 2016