A Socio-Technical Approach to Solve Grand Societal Challenges: Engineering Design and Innovation Scholars Program

Suny At Buffalo, Amherst NY

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 the University at Buffalo (UB) School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS). UB is a public research university in the State of New York. Over its five-year duration this project will fund scholarships and provide support services to thirty unique full-time students who are pursuing undergraduate and master’s (MS) degrees in engineering or computer science. First year undergraduates will receive four-year scholarships and MS students will receive 2-year scholarships. The project will introduce a humanistic approach to addressing grand societal challenges such as access to healthcare, access to clean air and water, and accessibility to technology. The project will demonstrate the ways students can use engineering design and their engineering and computer science knowledge and skills to make the world a better place for everyone to live. The project will establish a learning community, offer courses that study the societal impacts of engineering and computer science, and provide mentoring, professional development, experiential learning and research opportunities with faculty and community partners. These activities will be integrated with existing support activities and a new Social Impact Summer Research Program to foster academic success and retention. The project research focus will elucidate how cohort building, mentoring, research, and academic services support retention and graduation of low-income students in engineering and computer science. The overall goal of the project is to increase degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates in STEM fields by establishing an inclusive, cohort-based learning community focused on issues of societal grand challenges in engineering and computer science. The research program explores whether this focus on academic integration, research engagement, and support services increases students’ sense of belonging and retention in their academic community. The project will also demonstrate how support for MS students can improve job prospects or act as a bridge to the PhD for domestic low-income students. It is expected that the project will also increase the active engagement of all participants in hands-on/action/community-based research projects, supplementing traditional lecture-based teaching. Socio-technical research experiences may play a role in the effort to retain these students. The possibility that students who participate in the social impact research program will increase their psycho-social factors and subsequently their academic success will be investigated. The project has the potential to advance our understanding of how a socio-technical focus on grand societal challenges can increase the retention of students from groups underrepresented in STEM disciplines. 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.