Collaborative Research: Mentoring You is Learning for Me: Peer Mentor Preparation and Mentoring of Undergraduate Engineering Student Learning in Makerspaces

This project aims to serve the national interest by exploring the impact of a course designed to enhance peer mentors' capacity to facilitate learning in a makerspace-based course. Makerspaces are non-traditional learning environments where students learn to “tinker” and make things for the purpose of understanding how they work. Hands-on project-based learning – typical of makerspaces - can help students visualize abstract concepts bringing real world implications to light and making learning more interesting. Peer mentors often play a supervisory role in makerspaces and are knowledgeable about technical aspects of designing and prototyping. However, peer mentors' teaching preparation is usually minimal,thus limiting their capacity to facilitate student learning. This track 1 Engaged Student Learning IUSE project will design, implement and investigate the impact of peer mentor teaching preparation on their ability to facilitate learning in makerspaces. A variety of high impact practices, including role-playing, observation reporting, reflection and shadowing will be leveraged in a course specifically designed to significantly enhance peer mentors’ ability to facilitate student learning. The research planned intends to investigate the impact of the peer mentor teaching preparation course on both the peer mentor and the mentee. On the mentor side, impact on mentor professional identity, self-efficacy, leadership identity, and mentoring effectiveness will be evaluated. On the mentee side, engineering identity, sense of belonging, success, and team function will be investigated. The mentor preparation course will comprise training modules focused on a range of topics such as How People Learn, Education Methods Fundamentals, Diversity of Learners, Fostering a Growth Mindset, Effective Classroom Observation, Social Belonging, Inclusion, Student Identity, Fostering Teamwork, and Group Conflict Resolution. Training modules will be available online on an open-source basis, free for use by other institutions. Evaluation of the impact of the intervention will be accomplished through research questions to be investigated in a mixed methods study. Surveys, observations, interviews and reflections will be utilized to gather quantitative and qualitative data that will help determine the impact of the intervention on both the mentors and mentees. The NSF IUSE: EDU Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students. Through the Engaged Student Learning track, the program supports the creation, exploration, and implementation of promising practices and tools. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.