The Quality of Life Technology Model for Graduating and Transitioning Postsecondary Students with Disabilities in STEM

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The Quality of Life Technology Enrichment (QuOTE) Project was awarded to The University of Pittsburg's Quality of Life Technology Engineering Research Center (QoLT ERC). The NSF-funded QoLT is a unique partnership between Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh whose mission is to transform lives in a large and growing segment of the population: people with reduced functional capabilities due to aging or disability. The PI and her team will focus their efforts on building a model to transition students with disabilities across two critical academic junctures in post-secondary STEM education. They will create and evaluate a model that involves the cyber infrastructure development and that can be easily replicated and adapted by other post-secondary institutions. The specific objectives of the project are:1. Create a university-wide data collection system on students with disabilities;2. Develop an infrastructure to support an online learning community for faculty and students with disabilities in STEM fields (the ConnectAbility portal);3. Pilot and evaluate the model and the components of the model. The ConnectAbility portal will include web-based faculty and mentor training modules; a two-course series, one for Freshmen and one for Junior and Senior students related to transition issues; and an e-mentoring program that uses the two-course series to facilitate communication and interaction between mentors and mentees. The ConnectAbility portal will be designed to allow easy replication and adaptation by other institutions and serve as a one-stop gateway for all program staff and participants. The project will ensure the accessibility of the portal and comply with current accessibility standards and guidelines (e.g., the WCAG 2.0 and the Section 508 standards). The evaluation plan for this project will use educational process and outcome measures that address program effectiveness in (1) gathering and analyzing data and (2) developing, piloting, and evaluating interventions. Results from this project have the potential to inform and influence post-secondary STEM education for students with disabilities by building and evaluating a replicable model for the delivery of practices the promote success for students with disabilities in STEM post-secondary education and employment-related programs.