More Like this

1. LSAMP-NICE: Expanding International STEM Research for Underrepresented Minorities

   https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2021.668232  

   Benjamin, Mary E.; Yates, Denise; Dupuis, Steve (July 2021, Frontiers in Education)

   null (Ed.)

   Background: The global challenges of climate change, disease and hunger exceed national borders as do possibilities of sustained life, exploration and economic development in outer space. Both help to underscore the need for sustained international STEM research to leverage the talent embedded in different countries and in diverse groups within countries. This study focuses on the United States National Science Foundation provision of funds to its Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP) Program to create a National Center of Excellence LSAMP-NICE for the establishment of international STEM Research Partnerships with a particular emphasis on the integration of international collaborative research for underrepresented minority STEM faculty, students and graduates. The study focuses on the diffusion of this Center’s services to the LSAMP Community, a group of 56 LSAMP funded STEM enrichment programs located across the United States. We found that LSAMP-NICE used mass media (a website and two advertorials in a national journal) and an annual national meeting as its major diffusion strategies during its first two years. Forty-two (42) programs responded to the questionnaire. The majority of the respondents (71.4%) had not used the website; 88.1% had not read the Advertorial in Science Magazine; and 78.6% did not attend the national 2019 LSAMP-NICE Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. Our study suggests a need for additional diffusion techniques to reach the intended audience. Some respondent suggestions for diffusion include participation by LSAMP-NICE representatives at LSAMP Regional Conferences and Symposia, visits by LSAMP-NICE staff to LSAMP programs, forging relationships with higher education institutions abroad so LSAMP students can obtain summer or longer-term research experiences and providing technical assistance on applying for international travel funds. 

   more » « less
2. International Research Exposure: Impact on Early-Career, Undergraduate Engineering Students

   Preuss, Michael; Merriweather, Samuel; Butler-Purry, Karen; Walton, Shannon (October 2020, Proceedings of IConSES 2020--International Conference on Social and Education Science)

   Akerson, V.; Sahin, I. (Ed.)

   The Texas A&M University (TAMU) Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP) office provided funding to the Texas A&M University College of Engineering to support student participation in the Engineering Learning Community Introduction to Research (ELCIR) program. ELCIR is a two-week, study abroad, research program implemented in a learning community pattern. ELCIR has three purposes: (1) to expose sophomores to research, (2) to introduce students to cultural differences and global challenges, and (3) to provide students with the basic tools to prepare them for future research involvement. Participation in the multi-term program, which takes place at TAMU and in the Yucatan Peninsula, is limited to first-generation college students and/or students from underrepresented populations. The external evaluator for TAMU System LSAMP developed a survey for students to complete after their participation in the ELCIR international experience. Survey questions were designed to identify the impact of participation in ELCIR on students and gather participant suggestions for improvement of future LSAMP-supported international research experiences. The evaluator compiled information gathered from 92 participants during five years of ELCIR programming. This paper describes the participants’ self-reports of experience with and continued interest in study abroad, interest in another similar experience, subsequent involvement with undergraduate research, and ELCIR’s impact on their confidence regarding international travel, their awareness of, interest in, and plans regarding graduate school, their educational or career plans, and interest in employment outside the United States. Interest in or increases in interest in international travel, study abroad programming, graduate school, and employment outside the United States were found. These findings can inform engineering education programming for first-generation and minority students, an area of national need, for institutions across the United States. 

   more » « less
3. STEM validation among underrepresented students: Leveraging insights from a STEM diversity program to broaden participation.

   https://doi.org/10.1037/dhe0000300  

   Burt, Brian A.; Stone, Blayne D.; Motshubi, Rudisang; Baber, Lorenzo D. (February 2023, Journal of Diversity in Higher Education)

   Despite significant efforts to broaden participation in postsecondary science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education, students from historically minoritized populations continue to face systemic barriers related to access, departmental climate, and institutional practices. Previous research suggests that campus-level STEM diversity programs often serve as a valuable resource for persistence and completion among students from underrepresented populations. However, more knowledge is needed to better understand how students experience STEM diversity programs and identify with their specific practices and activities, how those practices and activities shape students’ experiences, and how the practices, activities, and participation influence how students view themselves as members of the STEM community. Increases in the number of underrepresented students completing STEM degrees would result in new innovations to address world problems, more varied representations of scientists, and more individuals who could mentor future generations of learners. This study of 20 underrepresented students, all of whom participated in the Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP) program, describes the programmatic influences of LSAMP that support students’ successful progress within STEM disciplines. Data reveal that: (a) students entered the LSAMP program with self-defined strengths; (b) the LSAMP program provided formal academic support; and (c) students experienced evolving forms of scientific and identity development. This study centers students’ voices to inform educational practices, policies, and future research focused on the persistent need to broaden participation in STEM careers. 

   more » « less
4. Expand Underrepresented Participation in High-Tech Start-Ups.

   Ivanitzki, Teddy; Johnson Rashida (February 2023, 2023 Conference for Industry and Education Collaboration (CIEC))

   CIEC panel (Ed.)

   Abstract: When starting small businesses, particularly in high-tech sectors like artificial intelligence (AI), digital twins, or the Internet of Things (IoT), women and underrepresented minority groups face additional hurdles in securing funding and investment. Not only is such a discrepancy in investment socially unjust, but it deprives the US of the advantages in innovation and global competition that could stem from the widening participation of the underrepresented population in innovative sectors. Although targeted support to women and underrepresented minority-owned businesses is being provided by the federal government and the private sector, more remains to be done to close the investment gap. The US Small Business Administration (SBA, 2013) provides more than $3.5 billion in funding to over 5,000 startups per year through its Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs. Moreover, the Small Business Act provides these programs with a mandate to target women and underrepresented minority groups. Despite this mandate from SBA, only 15% of those funds went to minority-owned companies (SBA, 2013). Funding opportunities from the private sector tell a similar story. Diversity VC, a non-profit partnership promoting diversity in Venture Capital, reported in 2019 that in a comprehensive survey (Azevedo, 2019) of around 10,000 founders receiving venture capital backing, only 9% were women and a mere 1% were Black. In order to i) accelerate innovation and increase participation of under-represented minorities in start-ups of “new industry”, and ii) to ensure US competitiveness in the global market, in 2010, the National Science Foundation (NSF) introduced the Small Business Postdoctoral Research Diversity Fellowship (SBPRDF) program and selected the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE) to administer the program. In recognition of ASEE’s successful performance in meeting the objectives of the SBPRDF program, in 2019 NSF/IIP (Industrial Innovation and Partnerships) program leadership selected ASEE to administer the Innovative Postdoctoral Entrepreneurial Research Fellowship (IPERF) program. The overarching goal of the IPERF program is to emphasize and strengthen the entrepreneurial development of underrepresented Fellows. The IPERF program also aims to advance best practices in postdoctoral programs and impart cross-disciplinary expertise in the application of new technologies like AI and IoT in “new industries” based on bioengineering and biochemistry technologies. 

   more » « less
5. Pre-College Summer Program in Entrepreneurial and Design Thinking Influences STEM Success for African American Students

   https://doi.org/10.15695/jstem/v7i2.03  

   Jackson, Caesar R; Whittington, Dawayne; Bradley, Tanina (February 2024, The Journal of STEM Outreach)

   Shepherd, Virginia L; Chester, Ann; Bass, Kristin M (Ed.)

   Sustained innovation and economic strength of the U.S depends on a greater participation of underrepresented minorities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). University-based outreach programs that serve African American and other minority populations should do more to infuse invention education in activities that engage pre-college students from these groups to motivate them to pursue STEM degrees. The Research, Discovery, and Innovation (RDI) Summer Institute is a design and science entrepreneurship program that is offered at North Carolina Central University to high school seniors who have been accepted for admission to a STEM degree program at the university. This study found the RDI Summer Institute program to be effective based on proximal outcomes of gains in composite entrepreneurial thinking skills (entrepreneurial, managerial, engineering design, and technical skills) as perceived by the participants and measured by pre- and post-surveys. Eighty-seven percent of the pre-college participants were African Americans, showed high levels of creativity and innovativeness, and presented product ideas that were conscientious in meeting their community needs. Program impact was assessed based on near-term and distal academic outcomes in college through a rigorously designed quasi-experiment which compared 31 case-control matched pairs of students who had been RDI participants and non-RDI participants. A conditional logistic regression showed first-year retention in STEM degree programs for students who had been RDI participants was five times that of students who had been non-RDI participants. Additionally, first-year STEM retention in differential comparisons favored female students, students from very low/low SES households, and students from single parent households. Also, students who had been RDI participants performed higher in STEM gatekeeper courses, and a strong positive impact of the RDI Summer Institute program was associated with higher STEM persistence even two and three years after pre-college students participated. 

   more » « less