Effect of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Sense of Belonging in Higher Education for STEM Students in the United States and Mexico

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Regardless of the formulated general goal, it would also be worth writing in the article what was the cognitive (scientific) goal of the research and what utilitarian (useful) goals did the authors set themselves when undertaking research with a group of students from two countries?

The review of the state of knowledge in the Introduction (in subchapters 1.1 and 1.2) provides the basis for formulating the research problem; it would be worth writing: The research problem was …. The research problem can also be linked to the indication of a gap in the current state of knowledge. Such issues of lack of knowledge were mentioned by the Authors in the Introduction, they only need to be called a gap, similarly to the review of the state of knowledge summed up by writing what the research problem results from it. Research questions RQ1, RQ2 and RQ3 (lines: 127-133) can be treated as a formulation of the research problem.

I would like to know whether the students included in the study were from first-cycle studies (engineer level studies) or second-cycle studies (master's studies)? It is worth including this information in the Materials and Methods chapter. In my opinion, it would also be worth including information on which years (semesters) the students who answered the questions studied. In my opinion, the semester of study, and thus the previous experience related to studying (and involvement in studying) could have shown the impact on the results of research and students' answers to questions. It is worth completing these details in the Materials and Methods chapter. I think that it would be worth using descriptive statistics to describe the groups of students participating in the study. On the basis of descriptive statistics (mean ± SD) it would be possible to present not only data on the share of women and men in the structure of students, but also their age, place of residence (taking into account villages and the size of cities).

Has preliminary research been carried out to identify problems with student responses? Identification of such problems allows for the verification of some questions and the way they are formulated so that they are understandable for students.

Did the authors not think about analyzing the answers to open questions using a keyword cloud? In this way, key elements/issues raised by students in response to individual questions could be identified and a valuable discussion could be developed on this basis.

Was the number of students included in the study representative for a given social group and the conclusions drawn from the research?

I would like to ask, where can I find answers to research questions RQ1, RQ2 and RQ3, asked in lines: 127-133? The symbols (designations) RQ1, RQ2 and RQ3 were used only once in the article (in lines: 127-133), which is why it is so difficult to find answers to these questions. If the research questions have been answered, directly or indirectly, it would be useful to mark this appropriately using the same symbols (RQ) as in lines 127-133.

In the title of Table 2, the authors wrote about a scale of 0-6 (line: 252), while in the header of this table a scale from 1 to 5 was mentioned, which is somewhat surprising. Of course, I can guess that the first column (No Effect...) was marked with "0" and the column Maj. Effect has been marked with 6. Such markings (0 and 6) should be included in the Table 2 header. Otherwise, confusion arises when the information given in the Table title does not match the information in the Table header. I have the same comments about Table 3.

In Tables 4 and 5, it would be worthwhile to write below the tables what the symbols (B, SE and P) used in the header mean. Of course, I can guess it, but it would be better to write it directly under the Tables.

Are the numbers in the second and third columns of Table 6 the results of calculations based on the Likert scale? I am not sure and I did not find such information in the text.

I think that in the discussion of the research results, taking into account the prospects for the development of further studies on student education, it would be worth pointing to the forms of approach proposed in the literature, involving students in online studies. An example of such an approach was included in the article "The topic of the ideal dairy farm can inspire how to assess knowledge about dairy production processes: A case study with students and their contributions". Other examples of studies taking into account students and their participation in online education are: "Student perceptions of online education during COVID-19 lockdowns: Direct and indirect effects on learning" and "Enriching traditional higher STEM education with online teaching and learning practices: Students' perspective”. It would be worth including these current aspects of evaluating student education in the remote version also in the discussion.

Author Response

"Please see the attachment." 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Very interesting and readable study. Thank you!

I have only a few comments: 

- The sampling has a significant gender imbalance that should be discussed 

- Information on pretesting, and piloting of the survey is missing and should be added.

- Information on quality criteria should be added to the quantitative as well as qualitative analysis (e.g. intercoder reliability).  

- In both countries, only single institutions were involved. This could be problematic for quantitative data collection. However, it is critically mentioned in the limitations. 

Author Response

"Please see the attachment." 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

This is a very interesting piece of work and it raises some critical issues supporting further understanding of the online learning experience.  The article represents a valuable contribution to literature as a result.

It might be useful to have a short note about your sampling approach and rationale for choosing the two institutions. While the results are clearly outlined and discussed, additional discussion regarding the selection process and therefore, the potential learning outcomes from the data, would further increase the value of the study.

The age gap between the students is outlined and justified - clearly this can have implications on the findings - but it is not clear why the decision was taken to use different age/class groups and this could perhaps be more defined.

Author Response

"Please see the attachment." 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

The study confirms what we consider to be a generalised appreciation in the dialogues held by teachers, students and both groups among themselves, at least in the environment we have personally experienced. Online work during the pandemic had a negative influence, in a general sense, on learning in the various disciplines, and even more so in those in which practice is a determining factor. Linked to this difficulty in learning, almost independent of the technical capacity of the telematic connection, we have also found it to be linked to a sense of lack of belonging. Presence is radically necessary in the field of teaching and education. This is an easily replicable study: we would find similar results in our teaching space.

Author Response

"Please see the attachment." 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf