High-achieving students in economically disadvantaged, rural schools lack access to advanced coursework necessary to pursue science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) educational and employment goals at the highest levels, contributing to the excellence gap. Out-of-school STEM programming offers one pathway to students’ talent development. Using a concurrent triangulation mixed-methods research design, this study was conducted to evaluate the experiences of 78 high-achieving students and their 32 teachers, participating in an extracurricular, school-based, STEM talent development program for rural students from economically disadvantaged communities. Findings suggest that students and teachers expressed satisfaction with program participation and that they thought more creatively and critically about their work. Results also showed that students’ perceptions of the mathematics and science activities were significantly different, which informs ways to improve programming for future high-achieving, rural students. These findings expand the literature supporting the use of informal STEM education environments for underserved gifted populations to increase engagement in and access to challenging curricula.

中文翻译：

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STEM 卓越和领导力计划：提高经济贫困农村社区中成绩优异的学生的 STEM 挑战和参与水平

经济状况不佳的农村学校的成绩优异的学生无法获得在最高水平上追求科学、技术、工程和数学 (STEM) 教育和就业目标所需的高级课程，这导致了卓越差距。校外 STEM 课程为学生的才能发展提供了一种途径。本研究采用并行三角测量混合方法研究设计，旨在评估 78 名成绩优异的学生和他们的 32 名教师的经历，他们参与了针对经济弱势社区的农村学生的课外、以学校为基础的 STEM 人才发展计划。调查结果表明，学生和教师对参与项目表示满意，并且他们对自己的工作进行了更具创造性和批判性的思考。结果还表明，学生对数学和科学活动的看法存在显着差异，这为未来高成就的农村学生提供了改进编程的方法。这些发现扩展了支持对服务不足的天才人群使用非正式 STEM 教育环境的文献，以增加对具有挑战性的课程的参与和获取。