Increasing the Success of Low-Income, Academically Talented Students in Engineering

New Mexico State University, Las Cruces NM

Investigators

Abstract

New Mexico State University's (NMSU) S-STEM project entitled "Increasing the Success of Low-Income, Academically Talented Students in Engineering" is a synergistic effort between the NMSU College of Engineering and NMSU student support programs and services. The project will support a cohort of twenty (20) academically talented engineering students who demonstrate financial need, with scholarship funding and Cohort Academic and Research Experience (CARE), which includes individualized self-assessment and monitoring, academic success workshops, undergraduate research experiences and internships, one-on-one relationships with faculty mentors, and training to increase self-efficacy, metacognitive self-awareness and self-study skills. The scholars will form a natural cohort sharing common challenges associated with low-income status, as well as common experiences in engineering. Historical NMSU data suggests that many will also share experiences as first-generation college students and historically underrepresented minorities, thereby broadening participation for students from those groups. Through industry partnerships, the project will enhance professional development and engineering workforce opportunities for NMSU?s engineering students. The objectives of the project are to: (1) provide financial assistance to academically talented students demonstrating financial need, (2) provide students with academic support, professional development, and research experience opportunities, (3) strengthen relationships and synergistic efforts with existing NMSU programs and services, and (4) increase retention of S-STEM scholars to degree completion and graduation. While implementing activities to accomplish these objectives, the project team will investigate the hypothesis that students' increased awareness of metacognition-based strategies motivates them to alter their study practices and the impact of students' study practices on learning and retention while iteratively developing valid and reliable instruments for use in this and future studies about study skills and metacognition-based practices as related to student success in STEM. Findings on the relationships among student study habits, learning performance, retention, metacognition, and self-efficacy for engineering will be of value to the STEM education field in general by providing faculty increased understanding of the value of metacognitive awareness among their students.