Three doctoral students, lab manager named National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellows

​UCI School of Education receives more than 10 percent of GRFP fellowships nationally in field of STEM Education and Learning Research
 
The National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program named three UCI School of Education doctoral students – Socorro Cambero, Marixza Torres, and Valery Vigil – GRFP fellows, all in the field of STEM Education and Learning Research.
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Additionally, Rachel Nicole Smith (B.S. ‘19), lab manager for the School of Education’s Working Memory and Plasticity (WMP) Lab, received a GRFP fellowship in STEM Education and Learning Research.
 
The NSF awarded 39 GRFP awards nationally in STEM Education and Learning Research. Each GRFP fellow receives a three-year annual stipend of $34,000, which goes toward tuition, fees, and opportunities for international research and professional development.

​​Socorro Cambero

​Cambero is a second-year doctoral student specializing in Teaching, Learning, and Educational Improvement (TLEI). Her research interests include Critical Race Theory, Latinx students in higher education, social and cultural capital, and Chicana Feminist Epistemology.
 
Cambero’s GRFP research, titled “The Role of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy in Developing the Perspectives and Practices of Future Latinx Science Teachers,” is building on her partnership research under the Orange County Education Advancement Network (OCEAN) with UCI CalTeach and Magnolia High School exploring how culturally responsive pedagogies are employed during distance learning. 
 
“As a young Latina student, I witnessed many of my community members navigate hardships in order to provide for their children,” Cambero said. “This experience fuels my motivation to produce scholarship documenting how the daily struggles of minoritized students can be utilized to inform and create meaningful learning experiences in science classrooms.”

Socorro Cambero

To understand how a course foregrounded on principles of culturally responsive pedagogies informs the perspectives and practices of future Latinx science teachers, Cambero will follow participants as student teachers for two years and as classroom teachers for one year, noting the course’s impact at different stages.
 
Associate Professor June Ahn and Assistant Professor Adriana Villavicencio serve as Cambero’s GRFP advisors.

Marixza Torres

​Torres is a first-year doctoral student specializing in Human Development in Context (HDiC). Her GRFP research, titled “Promoting Prosocial Behaviors to Increase STEM Motivation and Performance,” will examine whether an online prosocial behavior intervention promotes prosocial behaviors and STEM performance and motivation in U.S. Latinx youth.
 
“As a Latina, I want to identify and emphasize positive influences on Latinx educational achievement,” Torres said.  
 
Torres’ intervention study will use an online video game to investigate how social-emotional programs can promote academic confidence and positive school relationships and advance the science on how to close the gap in ethnic/racial disparities in STEM education.
 
“This GRFP fellowship will support my career goals of working in academia, serving as a mentor for under-represented minority (URM) students, and directly addressing the systemic barriers and challenges that undermine URM student success," Torres said.

Marixza Torres

Torres’s research interests include academic achievement, adolescent development, diversity and equity in education, resilience processes, and familism. Professor Gustavo Carlo serves as her advisor.

Valery Vigil

​Vigil is a first-year doctoral student specializing in Teaching, Learning, and Educational Improvement (TLEI). Her research is titled “Innovations in Artificial Intelligence: Promoting Latinx Children’s Science Learning and Engagement with a Bilingual Conversational Agent (CA).”
 
As a GRFP fellow, Vigil will develop and test an asset-based, equity-focused extension of a novel technology platform using artificially intelligent (AI) characters to engage preschoolers and families in science conversations.
 
“Although young children learn best when parents engage in ‘co-viewing’ (i.e., asking questions, discussing content, and drawing attention to relevant information), parents with limited education or financial resources face barriers to engaging in these kinds of interactions with their children, particularly around science,” Vigil said. “A bilingual conversational agent embedded in a PBS Kids science program will ask questions and provide contingent responses throughout the program to foster STEM interest and learning in preschool-aged children (3-to-5 years old).”

Valery Vigil

Vigil expects that her research, to be conducted in Santa Ana, will identify methods to increase learning, support, and participation of Latinx children in STEM.
 
“This will be the first study of its kind to carry out research with a bilingual socially contingent CA and will thus shed light on its affordances for promoting learning among children in multilingual families,” Vigil said.
 
Professor Mark Warchauer serves as Vigil’s advisor.

Rachel Nicole Smith

​Smith’s GRFP research is titled “Investigating Motivation and Self-Efficacy for Older Adults in a STEM Course.”
 
“Through working with older adults in the Working Memory and Plasticity Lab as lab manager, I observed how some older adults struggled with their self-efficacy when performing cognitive tasks,” Smith said.
 
Smith’s research will engage traditionally underrepresented older adults in a technology class at a lifelong learning institute where they will be randomly assigned to receive either motivational seminars or lessons supplementing the class.
 
“By providing learning opportunities to older adults, specifically traditionally underrepresented older adults, I hope to gain a better understanding of the effects of motivational seminars on self-efficacy and motivation for education in older adults,” Smith said. “I want to understand how awareness of one’s memory changes throughout the lifespan. My long-term goal is to promote successful aging.”

Rachel Nicole Smith

Smith joined the WMP lab while an undergraduate pursuing her bachelor’s degree in Cognitive Science. This fall, she will attend Washington University in St. Louis as a Ph.D. student in Education.

The NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines who are pursuing research-based master's and doctoral degrees at accredited United States institutions. The program is the country’s oldest fellowship program that directly supports graduate students in various STEM fields. Fellows are anticipated to become knowledge experts who can contribute significantly to research, teaching, and innovations in science and engineering. For more information, please click here.