NSF Award
2311181
With support from the Improving Undergraduate STEM Education: Hispanic-Serving Institutions Program (HSI Program), this Hub project aims to accomplish three distinct goals to: 1) foster Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) collaboration and networking; 2) support HSI faculty professional development; and 3) generate and disseminate knowledge by and about HSIs. In an effort to simultaneously engage multiple levers of change to achieve equitable educational outcomes and culturally validating environments for students that represent the full spectrum of diverse talent at HSIs, many HSIs respond by offering professional development for faculty on culturally responsive and relevant pedagogies. These worthwhile local efforts can be enhanced by creating opportunities for leveraging limited resources. This project will offer an alternative to a decentralized HSI information landscape by creating a freely accessible web-based HSI-Resource Hub for the nation’s growing network of public and private HSIs.<br/><br/>This HSI Resource Hub will bring together STEM faculty across the hundreds of current and emerging HSIs in the United States. The project will create a community of STEM scholars who not only adopt, but also advance/cultivate their culturally responsive and relevant pedagogy. The Hub will synthesize and regularly update information on what works in HSI contexts to minimize trial and error approaches to education reforms and to nurture an ongoing community of practice. The project intends to improve educational equity and STEM education for students at HSIs by developing a professional development toolkit on culturally relevant and responsive teaching, offering faculty professional development, enabling seamless resource sharing, leveraging knowledge production, and enhancing opportunities for networking. In addition, the Hub will include other activities focused on the dissemination of practical and scholarly knowledge by and about HSIs, including a database of scholarly research on STEM education at HSIs, bi-annual topical briefs on asset-based approaches for broadening participation in STEM, an online professional learning community, and an online forum for faculty at HSIs to collaborate and share resources. These efforts will facilitate the spread of empirically based practices supporting culturally responsive and relevant pedagogy. This project is funded by the HSI Program, which aims to enhance undergraduate STEM education, broaden participation in STEM, and build capacity at HSIs.<br/><br/>This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
