Informal learning organizations such as museums, zoos, aquaria, gardens, and community-based organizations are often positioned as having programming that fill a void that may exist in the lives of youth participants. Often these institutions do not recognize the assets that youth gain from their own homes and communities and bring to bear in these programs and that contribute to their success and persistence in STEM and academics. In this paper, we problematize the prevailing deficit-oriented approach to STEM enrichment programs for youth who are underrepresented in STEM. Drawing from Tara Yosso’s theory of community cultural wealth, we describe the STEM identity and trajectories of three individuals as they navigated a long-term, museum-based, informal science learning program. Using Yosso’s framework, we describe the capital that youth brought into the program and the ways that they leveraged this capital as they moved from middle to high school, and into their postsecondary studies and early careers in the sciences. Furthermore, we describe how their existing capital intertwined with capital they gained from the museum program in ways that fostered persistence and achievement in science.

非正式学习型组织（例如博物馆，动物园，水族馆，花园和社区组织）通常被定位为具有填补青年参与者生活中可能存在的空白的程序。通常，这些机构不认识青年从自己的家庭和社区中获得的资产，并在这些计划中发挥作用，这些资产有助于他们在STEM和学术界取得成功和坚持不懈。在本文中，我们对在STEM中代表性不足的年轻人的STEM强化计划中普遍采用的面向赤字的方法提出了质疑。从塔拉·尤索（Tara Yosso）的社区文化财富理论出发，我们描述了三个人在一项长期的，基于博物馆的非正式科学学习计划中所经历的STEM身份和轨迹。使用Yosso的框架，我们描述了青年人带入该计划的资金，以及他们从初中升入高中，进入中学后学习和从事科学早期职业时利用该资金的方式。此外，我们描述了他们现有的资本如何与他们从博物馆计划中获得的资本交织在一起，从而促进了科学的持久性和成就。