Outreach and Scaling-up Activities for the ALIGNED Project

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This RAPID award is being used to augment capabilities of a new geospatial undergraduate student recruitment toolkit under development at the American Association of Geographers that is helping geoscience and geography departments identify and reach students both within their common source regions and from among their undecided major population. AAG's innovative department toolkit combines a spatial decision support system prototype and an online clearinghouse of materials for increasing the participation of members of underrepresented groups in geography/geosciences. This grant is being used to incorporate new outreach and scaling-up activities that will address two objectives that remain central to the ALIGNED project's original goals. Additional key features are being incorporated into the toolkit and the departmental data holdings are being expanded, in preparation for broader use as a national level toolkit. Undergraduate profile data of approximately 50 additional departments are being added to the system. In addition, a map layer that locates institutions with active NSF awards from the Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation Program (LSAMP), Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP), Centers for Research Excellence in Science and Technology (CREST), Historically Black Colleges and Universities Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP), Increasing the Participation and Advancement of Women in Academic Science and Engineering Careers (ADVANCE), and/or Opportunities for Enhancing Diversity in the Geosciences (OEDG) programs is being developed. AAG is also producing seven new outreach videos that address common issues and considerations about the geosciences that often inform decisions made by under-reprented students regarding education and career pathways. The themes being featured in these videos have been developed through consultation with representatives from minority-serving institutions and professional societies supporting these communities, including the American Geophysical Union (AGU), American Geological Institute (AGI), Hispanic Association of Colleges & Universities (HACU), and, the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC). These activities are being conducted in conjunction with events being organized in at the AAG's Annual Meeting in New York, February 2012, where more than 8,500 attendees are expected and special coordinated activities among the major geography and geoscience associations are being planned.