AGEP Longitudinal Study - AGEP LS

American Institutes For Research In The Behavioral Sciences, Arlington VA

Investigators

Abstract

AIR will conduct a 3-year longitudinal study of the National Science Foundation?s Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP) program. The proposed project builds on the accomplishments of AIR AGEP studies and expands upon previous and the current AGEP focused national evaluation work. By renewing the existing grant, AGEP-LS will draw on extant data from the Survey of Earned Doctorates (SED) and the Survey of Doctoral Recipients (SDR) to track national enrollment and completion trends of underrepresented minorities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields as well as in the social, behavioral and economic sciences (SBE). AIR will also deploy a software system, the AGEP-Tracking System and Registry (AGEP-TSR), to collect individual level data on AGEP students that will track their participation in AGEP supported activities at the alliance and campus levels. Through AGEP-TSR, the longitudinal study will be able to account for individual level outcomes and longer-term workforce outcomes. Through AGEP-TSR, AIR will systematically monitor performance of the participating AGEP Alliances over time and also be able to survey student participants at regular intervals. Finally, AIR will conduct intensive case studies over time with fixed cohorts of students, faculty, and AGEP program administrators within each of nine Alliances Intellectual Merit. The proposed study would be the first to measure AGEP impact over time on a controlled population of students and faculty and to evaluate the effects of AGEP-supported institutional transformation activities over a measured time period. AGEP-LS also will be the first effort to evaluate the influence of the AGEP SBE program in these fields with minority students. As such, the study will advance what we know and understand about how AGEP affects the educational success of STEM and SBE doctoral students and the diversification of the professoriate. Broader Impact. AGEP is explicitly designed to increase minority representation in STEM and SBE doctoral production and in the professoriate, but the field needs to know more about how program components work. Lessons learned about program efficacy over time through this study will be disseminated to the AGEP Alliances and to the broader higher education community. Through specific dissemination strategies, the study findings are intended to broaden the participation of underrepresented groups in graduate education and the professoriate in key fields.