Sustainability of best practices for minority STEM student retention and success

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This grant funds Phase III of the Model Institution for Excellence (MIE) program at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) minority-serving institutions to be designated, nationwide, as a Model Institution for Excellence (MIE). The NSF MIE Program has the overarching goal of increasing the number of under represented minorities that pursue and earn degrees in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM). At UTEP, this goal has been translated into an effort to increase the retention and graduation rates of low-income Mexican-American students who pursue STEM careers. The UTEP MIE Project has evolved into activities that support best practices focused on student success: The Academic Center for Engineers and Scientists (ACES) The Center for Effective Teaching and Learning (CETaL) The Circles of Learning for Entering Students (CircLES) The UTEP Curriculum, Course, and Laboratory Improvement Project (CCLI) The UTEP Research Experiences for Undergraduates Project (REU) With Phase III funds, UTEP will implement a sustainability plan that guarantees the long-term funding of such best practices for the benefit of it's historically underserved Hispanic-majority student body. The NSF MIE Program is an ongoing experiment to create national models for higher education that will promote participation and achievement of underrepresented minorities in STEM, consistently and effectively. At UTEP, MIE was envisioned as an eleven-year effort to develop, implement and test an theory that views the college experience as an organic system that affects student persistence and attrition. The theory is based on a longitudinal model of individual departure that can be analyzed in terms of a student's pre-entry attributes, intentions, goals and commitments, institutional experiences, and integration to academic and campus social life. MIE activities developed at UTEP reflect the main components of this longitudinal model.