NSF Award
1930341
This project will contribute to the national need for well-educated scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students with demonstrated financial need at Augusta University. Augusta University is one of four public comprehensive research universities in Georgia, with a highly diverse student population, especially in STEM majors where two-thirds are female and nearly half are from groups underrepresented in science. Over its five-year duration, this project will fund three-year scholarships to 30 students who are pursuing bachelor's degrees in Biological Sciences, Chemistry, Mathematics, and/or Physics. The project seeks to provide unique learning opportunities for student growth and development through workshops focused on improving persistence in STEM, enhancing personal and academic skills, and increasing career awareness. It is expected that the workshops will help students develop important skills that are not often integrated into STEM courses. The workshops should also stimulate student interest and self-efficacy in STEM. A mentoring program that includes peer, faculty, and professional mentors will provide Scholars with a network of academic and career guidance. A Learning Community will complement the mentoring program and workshops by providing an environment to build a strong sense of community. The project will support STEM faculty engagement in ongoing professional development, thus facilitating significant improvement of formal STEM learning for all students. The project intends that Scholars will graduate with critical skills and motivation needed for success in the STEM workforce. This project will contribute new knowledge about the persistence of undergraduates in STEM educational and career tracks, including the persistence of students from populations that are underrepresented in STEM. <br/> <br/>The overall goal of this project is to increase STEM degree completion of high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need. Institutional data suggest that, for a significant number of students, the obstacles to their successful pursuit of a STEM degree do not result from lower academic capabilities. This project seeks to address potential non-academic obstacles to success, including financial obstacles, loss of interest and/or limited career awareness, low STEM self-efficacy, and the classroom learning environment. The project components are intentionally designed to: a) positively impact student self-efficacy, including STEM self-efficacy; b) stimulate and support a sustained interest in STEM courses of study and STEM careers, c) create a sense of belonging through a strategic mentoring program and a learning community; and d) improve the quality of STEM classroom instruction. Early interventions via workshops will focus on increasing students' interest in STEM careers and courses of study and helping students gain valuable skills in an interdisciplinary, low-stakes social environment. A mixed methods research design will be used to determine the effectiveness of each aspect of the project, leading to a better understand factors that influence persistence in STEM. The overall effectiveness of the project will be measured using student retention and graduation rates. Student interest, STEM self-efficacy, and sense of belonging will also be assessed using validated survey instruments. Quantitative data will be triangulated with qualitative data obtained from student and faculty focus groups to provide insight into which project initiatives had the most significant impact on student persistence in STEM. The results of the project will be disseminated to the scientific community by presentations in scientific conferences, publication in peer-reviewed journals, and posting on the project website. This project is funded by NSF's Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, which seeks to increase the number of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need who earn degrees in STEM fields. It also aims to improve the education of future STEM workers, and to generate knowledge about academic success, retention, transfer, graduation, and academic/career pathways of low-income students.<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.
