Using Scholarships, Teams and Research to Engage Undergraduate STEM Students at an HSI

Cal Poly Humboldt Sponsored Programs Foundation, Arcata CA

Investigators

Abstract

With support from the Improving Undergraduate STEM Education: Hispanic-Serving Institutions Program (HSI Program), this project will contribute to the national need for well-educated scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians by providing financial and academic supports for STEM majors at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt (Cal Poly Humboldt). Over its three-year duration, this project will provide peer and faculty mentoring, tutoring, and up to three years of scholarship support to low-income students pursuing bachelor's degrees in biochemistry, biology, chemistry, computer science, informatics, or mathematics. Scholarship recipients will be placed into cohorts to explore career opportunities, build workforce skills, participate in job shadowing, and engage in research. Successful interventions will be scaled beyond the project's initial participants to the broader population of majors at the institution. The overall goal of this project is to increase STEM degree completion in the focal disciplines and generate new knowledge on effective aspects of the multi-part project model. The long-term expected outcomes of the project include increased student retention in STEM programs, reduced time to graduation, increased graduation rates, and increased job placement or entry into graduate school. The mentoring plan, co-curricular activities, and rich experiences align with the project's goal to strengthen participating students' identity as STEM learners and future professionals. Project research will use a mixed-methods approach to explore how each experience and support system impacts students' science identity. Outcomes and practices will be broadly disseminated to other institutions of higher education concerned with assisting and retaining a diverse population of students. The long-term outcomes of the project include increased student retention in STEM programs, reduced time to graduation and improved graduation rates in STEM, and increased placement in the STEM workforce for Cal Poly Humbolt STEM graduates. This project is funded by the HSI Program, which aims to enhance undergraduate STEM education, broaden participation in STEM, and build capacity at HSIs. 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.