Mentored Excellence Toward Research and Industry Careers

California State University-Long Beach Foundation, Long Beach CA

Investigators

Abstract

This five-year project aims will contribute to the national need for highly qualified STEM professionals by increasing the number of STEM students who earn a bachelor's degree in STEM and enter a STEM career or pursue a STEM graduate degree. To achieve this goal, California State University, Long Beach (CSULB) will provide scholarships to 44 undergraduates who are pursuing bachelor's degrees in mathematics, chemistry, geology, or physics. The project estimates that each Scholar will receive approximately two years of scholarship support. This support will relieve unmet financial obligations sufficiently to enable the Scholars to focus on academic responsibilities and related opportunities. The project aims to develop an institutional pathway that combines career development with experiential learning to foster student leadership. Project activities include faculty and peer mentorship and mindset training designed to elevate students' confidence and sense of belonging. To improve students' scientific and workplace skills, the project will provide Scholars with career and internship preparation, advising, experiential learning, and leadership development training. The project will develop service-learning opportunities within local communities that enable Scholars to use their STEM knowledge to help local businesses and community programs. The project aims to educate student leaders who know how to use their STEM expertise to positively impact their local communities and society at large. The project's research plan is designed to investigate: how a three-tiered, progressive admission process affects recruitment of low-income and academically talented students, including first generation and under-represented minority students; how students' non-cognitive characteristics affect their success in project activities and in STEM; how the project activities affect students' recognition of the potential for STEM to serve and advance local and regional communities; and how the project activities affect students' sense of themselves as potential leaders in STEM. Results of formative and summative project evaluation will define which project activities are most effective at supporting skills development, building confidence, and removing barriers for the participants. Two, one-year Graduate Research Fellows will be recruited to study the project's impact on increasing students' confidence, skills, efficacy, and leadership qualities. Results from this project can inform STEM educators about effective design of supports that meet the needs of students at critical transitions in their STEM education. This project is funded by the NSF Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, which seeks to increase the number of low-income, academically high-achieving students with demonstrated financial need who earn degrees in STEM fields. It also aims to improve the education of future scientists, engineers, and technicians, and to generate knowledge about academic success, retention, transfer, graduation, and academic/career pathways of low-income students. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.