The National Science Foundation (NSF) terminated a $343,789 federal grant last week sent to Alabama A&M in 2023 to study systemic racism in mathematics teacher education.
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and the NSF announced last week that they were terminating some active research grants due to recent executive orders by President Donald Trump.
According to a description of the study, "This project will make significant contributions to racial equity in STEM by identifying and describing forms of systemic racism inherent in mathematics teacher education programs (MTEPS)."
"Racialized mathematics teaching practices are systemic in elementary mathematics classrooms, and the impacts of systemic inequities in K-12 mathematics education both deter students from diverse backgrounds from becoming interested in math, reducing their likelihood of engaging in STEM; and affect students' identities by devaluing or erasing their diverse cultural backgrounds and perspectives. Since teachers are the key to ensuring racial equity in classrooms, identifying racialized mathematics experiences must begin with mathematics teacher education programs," the grant description states. "In this innovative study, a project team comprised of mathematics teacher educators of color (MTECS) will collaborate with 12-15 preservice teachers of color (PTOCS), in authentic partnership, from three unique MTEPS (at an HBCU, an HSI, and a PWI) to form a cross-site critical mathematics professional learning community (CMPLC). By documenting PTOCS racialized mathematics experiences across three sites, The project will: (1) Gather fundamental knowledge on the racialized mathematical learning and teaching experiences of PTOCS, (2) Build knowledge of racialized mathematics experiences and their overall impact on the preparation of PTOCS, and (3) Inform teacher education programs across content and contexts."
The grant description continues, "By attaining a deeper understanding of PTOCS mathematics learning experiences, we advance racial equity by exposing racist teaching practices that disadvantage historically marginalized students and identifying changes in teacher education that will identify and address practices that obstruct racial equity in STEM."
According to a public database maintained by Noam Ross, executive director of the nonprofit rOpenSci, and Scott Delaney, an epidemiologist at Harvard University, the University of South Alabama also recently had two grants cancelled worth $1,980,584. The grants were for a "competitive semiconductor workforce, including women and other underrepresented minorities" and a study to "evaluate, identify and change the policies, processes, and everyday practices that contribute to racial inequities in STEM education."
NSF also recently canceled three grants worth $1,761,892 to the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) and Auburn University.
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