Improved STEM education for 21st century environmental scientists through stratified mentoring and professional networking

University Of Texas At El Paso, El Paso TX

Investigators

Abstract

Providing students with meaningful hands-on experiences, especially place- and culturally-based experiences and close mentoring, is key to producing a professional workforce capable of effectively studying, interpreting, and communicating the impacts of anthropogenic and natural change on the Earth's systems. This project will establish and implement a stratified mentoring model to enhance recruitment, retention, and training of Hispanic students in the Environmental Sciences in the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), and to better prepare 21st century environmental scientists for academic and technical STEM workforces. This program will produce a significant number of well-trained Hispanic environmental scientists, thus positively contributing to the national pipeline of STEM workers, and helping to narrow the underrepresentation gap. Equally important, this project will disseminate and explore the transferability of this innovative strategy to other institutions. The primary goal of the proposed program will be to develop an interdisciplinary stratified mentoring approach to environmental science studies. The structure of the stratified mentoring team is innovative, where multiple faculty from UTEP, and professionals from federal, state and local agencies, industry, private sectors and academia will collectively and collaboratively mentor senior undergraduates through interdisciplinary, hands-on research projects, and in turn, these seniors will supervise sophomore undergraduate students. This goal will be achieved by curriculum reform, where senior students will be exposed to three consecutive semesters of research experience including summer internships. These changes will allow for closer interactions among environmental science majors, and between students, faculty, and their future employers. Taking advantage of the region's "educational closed-loop", seniors will further improve communication and collaboration skills through service-learning and community outreach, thus aiding in the recruitment of new majors. A formal evaluation will be used to quantify the impact of the proposed activities, and assess the effectiveness of the stratified mentoring approach. This stratified mentoring approach will serve as an instructional model for other institutions.