STEP: A Multidisciplinary Bridge Program in a Liberal Arts Setting

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The program focuses on both recruitment and retention initiatives as ways to increase the number of SMET graduates. Participation in an on-campus research bridge program in the summer leading into the freshman year is the enticement presented to high school students as part of recruitment efforts. The program is being advertised by the Admissions Office and through visits by science faculty and student researchers to math and science "magnet" schools. Women in particular are targeted. Participant selection is based on expressed interest in science and academic profile, with inclusion not only of students who have demonstrated academic excellence but also of those in the middle range of the applicant pool on a variety of measures. The pre-matriculation summer research experience is six weeks long. Participants work with individual faculty on the latter's research, spending a minimum of seven hours daily in the laboratory. As a major part of developing a sense of community, they live in a "summer science" dorm. Weekly luncheons with faculty, followed by discussions on topics ranging from adjustment to college life to women in science, and special trips out of town to athletic and cultural events are also part of the effort to integrate them into a network of peers and faculty. Reinforcement of this feeling of community continues into the academic year with a poster-session in October, at which students present reports of their summer research activities and findings, and with biweekly luncheons and seminars. An important part of the project, made possible with matching funds from Hamilton College, is a second, 10 week-long, summer research experience for each participant with the same or different professor, as they choose. Students are encouraged to internalize research into their personal academic vision through an apprenticeship relationship with their supervising professor and through opportunities to publish and to present their work at conferences. They also serve as peer-mentors to a new group of incoming students, thereby ensuring continuity of the community.Currently 10 faculty in biochemistry, chemistry, computer science, neuroscience, and physics have opened their laboratories to participants.