Early Career Undergraduate Research Experience (eCURe)

Pasadena City College, Pasadena CA

Investigators

Abstract

The Early Career Undergraduate Research Experience (eCURe) program is an innovative model for improving STEM education at the community college level. Based on the effective practices demonstrated at the university level, the eCURe project seeks to use undergraduate research as a platform for engaging students in STEM education, promoting STEM careers, improving STEM skills training and enhancing critical thinking. More specifically, the project will be investigating how early research experiences for community college students lead to improved success and retention in their STEM academic path. This program, in collaboration with four-year institutions and industry partners, will create an employer-driven accelerated contextualized STEM pathway that provides more research-like experiences on a community college campus via redesigned curriculum and instructional methodology, and lead to summer internships for students at partner institutions. This project will allow underrepresented and economically disadvantaged students from the community college to have a similar experience as their counterparts at four year schools. These early research experiences will better prepare these students for both the workforce and transfer. This project will develop model curriculum that can be adopted at other community colleges and lead to increased diversity in the STEM fields. The eCURe model includes purposeful redesign of STEM curriculum, including the scaffolding of research knowledge and skills across multiple STEM disciplines. Furthermore, the model will develop three levels of research experiences beginning with research exposure and building to full research internships similar to the National Science Foundation's Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) model. The incorporation of current research methods into introductory level STEM course work is unique at the community college level and the eCURe project will serve as a national model for building research capacity in two-year programs. Providing community college students with authentic research training and experiences within industry, government and university laboratories promises to increase real-world applied skills in STEM students. The eCURe project will serve as a pilot for determining the most effective means of providing STEM education that include required research knowledge and skills. The size and diversity of Pasadena City College makes it a prime candidate to adopt such a project and to serve as an exemplar for other community colleges throughout the nation. The project has been developed with a broad intent to ensure the ability to replicate the model at other institutions.