LSAMP Phase IV (2006-2011) Western Alliance to Expand Student Opportunities (WAESO)

Arizona State University, Scottsdale AZ

Investigators

Abstract

Project Summary: LSAMP Phase IV (2006-2011) Western Alliance to Expand Student Opportunities (WAESO) WAESO combines the efforts of an alliance of 35 colleges and universities, 8 professional organizations, 2 government laboratories, 9 educational organizations, 21 corporations, 147 academic and support programs, 500 resource individuals, approximately 85% of whom are scientists, engineers, and other faculty, and 15% administrators with just over 40% of these resource individuals being underrepresented minorities. Overall Objective: Phase IV WAESO is a comprehensive, concerted, sequenced effort that proposes to use LSAMP NSF funding for underrepresented undergraduate student activities, including the transition of college sophomores, juniors, and seniors toward graduate school and the development of high technology products with application or dissemination both regionally and nationally. Through the Bridges to the Doctorate program our LSAMP will continue our successful multidisciplinary faculty mentoring network to transition these students to STEM Ph.D. programs. Moreover, with NSF Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP) support, PHASE IV WAESO students will be assisted through the doctorate and even beyond to faculty status or careers in the corporate or government sectors. Based on the successes of Phase I and Phase II in doubling the number of graduates per year of our target population and being on pace for a similar doubling goal in Phase III, we propose to take on the formidable task of achieving B.S. degree rates reflective of our substantial underrepresented minority population. Using the information form the census bureau (http://www.census.gov) USA July 2004 reports for Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, and Utah state that our region has a population which of the 12,370,000 people estimated in this report, 34% (compared with 28% nationally) are American Indian, African American, and Hispanic. In order to move much closer to achieving parity with the relatively stable overall STEM B.S. degree production rate for the proposed Phase IV cohort of 10,551, we propose the numerical goal in the year 2011 of 2,630 STEM B.S. degrees awarded to American Indian, African American, and Hispanic as accomplishing much towards achieving parity with our regional population of these Americans, which would result in a representation of greater than 25% and put us well on the way to successfully reaching parity. Specific Goals: Based on the tremendous success of our current WAESO LSAMP Phase III alliance that has been funded in part by a NSF cooperative agreements since 1990, we specifically propose to: (1) Further institutionalize our highly successful Phase III activities to ensure that alliance goals and objectives will continue to be achieved beyond NSF support; (2) Double once again the annual BS degree rate from a new (adjusted due to cohort membership changes) current baseline of 1,315 underrepresented student science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) BS degrees to 2,630 within five years (by 2011); (3) Further expand, sustain, and connect LSAMP BS graduates, especially LSAMP Bridge to the Doctorate fellowship students, with our MGE@MSA AGEP and other AGEPs nationally to create, enhance, and institutionalize permanent pathways to successful graduate study and academic careers. The intellectual merit of our proposed activity is that we will draw upon and expand our alliances large existing communities of underrepresented minority STEM scholar/researcher/teacher/mentors and student apprentice scholar/researcher/teacher/protgs working collaboratively to further structure and sustain a research-based hot house environment to create wide-spread regional systemic change with dramatically positive national implications and repercussions. The broader impacts of our proposed activity is to achieve and sustain a level of admission, development, graduation, placement, promotion, and tenure of baccalaureate, masters, doctoral, post-doctoral, junior faculty, and senior faculty underrepresented STEM scholars in proportion to the diversity of our society as a whole. We have strong reason to believe that our WAESO LSAMP alliance will become a national model for the strengthening and diversification of STEM students and faculty to ensure that the U.S. will continue to lead the world in research and technology despite the increasingly intense global competition of the 21st century.