Increasing STEM interest through the use of the learning environment and instructional technologies.

A search for keywords such as workforce development or interest in space physics or plasma physics in major literature search engines provides minimal data on efforts to address the concerns stated in the “Fusion in the Era of Burning Plasma Studies: Workforce Planning for 2004 to 2014” related to attracting students into fusion science and/or engineering careers. The CASPER group has produced a series of interventions to address this issue that includes CASPER’s seamless pathway and the CASPER physics circus. More recently, CASPER members have partnered with a professional development institution and an architectural firm to measure and produce interventions at the elementary school level that are designed to increase learning skills such as critical thinking, collaboration, self-reflection, and student engagement. This ongoing, longitudinal study started prior to the Covid pandemic and as such is now providing data to compare effects of the pandemic, recovery-from-the-pandemic efforts, efficacy and impact on student engagement, and correlation to STEM areas. These traits have been identified as the critical elements required to build confidence and interest in STEM and consequently in areas of Physics. Thus, any proper understanding or measuring of these STEM traits will provide significant information into designing proper interventions to increase and enhance STEM interest at the secondary school level. This presentation will discuss current efforts by CASPER and its collaborators to increase the learning skills mentioned above and student engagement. It will also discuss how this is measured using an innovative statistical analysis (Rasch analysis) that produces a linear scale that can be used to compare results across different groups.