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A group of interdisciplinary faculty at Hostos Community College, an institution that serves a largely first-generation student population that is over 90% minority, 69% women, who often live below the poverty line and lack academic role models, has created the NSF-funded Hostos Engineering Academic Talent (HEAT) Scholarship Program designed to increase the number of low-income academically talented students who persevere and graduate with associate and baccalaureate degrees in engineering. HEAT provides its scholars with financial support, a combined mentoring model where scholars work with STEM faculty and more advanced engineering students throughout the year, and the opportunity to participate in mentored research experiences. Student successes include improved GPAs, rates of retention, graduation from 2- and 4-year institutions, and acceptance to STEM graduate programs or entering the workforce as compared to students not participating in HEAT. Surveys of Scholars indicate that combined mentorship is the most important component of HEAT. Thus, HEAT is a model of intervention that serves to expand the STEM pipeline to create a more inclusive and diverse engineering workforce. 

There has been a nationwide effort to increase the number, caliber, and diversity of the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce. Research on student development shows that while there is a need, providing financial aid alone is not a sufficient factor for academic success of low-income academically talented college students. Thus, Hostos Community College has recently created the NSF-funded Hostos Engineering Academic Talent (HEAT) Scholarship Program which offers its scholars financial support and experience with a combined mentoring model where students work with faculty and peers during the academic year. This research then systematically investigated the impact of a combined faculty- and peer-mentorship approach with a population not yet studied, undergraduate STEM students at minority-serving community colleges. Preliminary data indicates that the combined mentoring approach has positive effects on scholar’s academic performance and STEM identity. The findings are expected to be generalizable to other populations, and hence provide an opportunity to expand the combined mentorship model to other STEM programs at a variety of institutions whose students could benefit from its implementation.