Pathway to Professions in the Biosciences: A Community College and University Partnership for STEM Degree Completion

University Of New Hampshire, Durham NH

Investigators

Abstract

This project will contribute to the national need for well-educated scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students with demonstrated financial need at Great Bay Community College and the University of New Hampshire. Over its five-year duration, this project will provide two-year scholarships to 30 students who transfer from Great Bay Community College to the University of New Hampshire. The scholarships will support the students during the final two years of their Bachelor of Science degree programs in life sciences. The project aims to increase student persistence in life sciences by connecting scholarship support with other support mechanisms including mentorship, an academic learning community centered on professional development, and an experiential learning component related to students' career interests. The project will also further knowledge about how different learning experiences and supports affect the self-efficacy and career decisions of low-income community college students. This project has the potential to contribute to improving the national bioscience enterprise and increasing the diversity of the bioscience workforce. The overall goal of the project is to increase degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates in STEM fields. The project aims to increase the number of students who complete their associate degree at the community college level, matriculate to the four-year university, and complete their bachelor's degree in a life sciences field. Self-efficacy and professional development experiences are known to increase student persistence in STEM degrees. However, little is known about how these factors affect transfer students, especially those from non-traditional academic backgrounds. This project will investigate how the activities of this project affect development of students' self-efficacy. Specifically, this project has the potential to advance the understanding about how a professional learning community and formal mentorship influence community college transfer students' academic self-efficacy, their perceptions of the social supports related to degree completion and their career goals, and how a study abroad experience influences low-income students' academic self-efficacy and career goals. This project will be evaluated using adaptive, formative and summative mixed-methods with information from interviews and surveys, and quantitative data collected from students, faculty, and the leadership team. Results of this project will be made available through three mechanisms: 1) locally within the University and Community College communities at local annual research conferences, and through invited seminars; 2) regionally through STEM education research groups in northern New England through seminars, webinar events, and annual gatherings; and 3) nationally, to the broader STEM education research community through presentations at conferences such as the annual Association of American Colleges and Universities Transforming Undergraduate STEM Education meeting, and the NSF S-STEM conference. Results will be submitted for publication in peer-reviewed journal such as Life Sciences Education and the Journal of Biology Education. This project is funded by NSF's Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, which seeks to increase the number of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need who earn degrees in STEM fields. It also aims to improve the education of future STEM workers, 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.