Cultivating Physics Identity and Belonging for Women in Physics

This project aims to serve the national interest by investigating how a student-led mentorship program supports undergraduate physics majors to succeed. The nation needs well-prepared STEM professionals as growth of the STEM workforce outpaces overall workforce growth. Despite this growth, women still make up only 29% of physical scientists and earn only 21% of the bachelor’s degrees in physics.

Increasing the fraction of women and people from underrepresented groups in physics is important for the strength of physics as a discipline and for the growth of the science and engineering workforce. The Pion Program is a student-led mentorship and career conceptualization program designed to improve the preparation of the next generation of physics students for graduate school and the workforce.

The program is being developed and launched by the Society of Physics Students and Sigma Pi Sigma, professional organizations for students under the umbrella of the American Institute of Physics. The project aims to study the impact of this program on the development of physics identity and sense of belonging among women and students from underrepresented groups.

Because they are connected to persistence, it is valuable to understand what interventions can increase belonging and physics identity.

This project builds on extensive literature that has shown the importance of students’ sense of physics identity and belonging to persistence in STEM. The results will expand on a well-established model of physics students’ identity to better understand two key aspects of identity: (1) how the ability to conceptualize physics careers beyond the academy impacts women’s physics identity and belonging, particularly for students who do not intend to follow an academic career trajectory and (2) how physics leadership contributes to a student’s identity and sense of belonging.

With mentorship as a central component of the Pion Program and a best practice in helping students develop a sense of identity and belonging, the project will explore the contributions of mentorship to students’ understanding of the career opportunities available to physics degree recipients and to the development of leadership identity. For students who participate in the Pion Program as event leaders and peer mentors, the project will explore the development of leadership identity and the connection to physics identity and sense of belonging.

These explorations seek to broaden current models of physics identity and belonging. The NSF IUSE: EHR 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.