An Integrated Program for Recruitment, Retention, and Graduation of Academically Talented Low Income Engineering Students

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This Scholarships for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (S-STEM) project at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) seeks to address the high discrepancy in graduation rates of low-income talented students and high-income talented students in Engineering. By recruiting low-income academically talented students to participate in various support structures and opportunities, including a guaranteed internship, the project endeavors to improve student success among this population with scholarships that will support 30 students. An important outcome is for each scholar to find an engineering job or a STEM graduate program within 6 months of graduation. The approach includes a Summer Bridge Program before the first Fall semester, which pairs each scholar with a faculty mentor and a student ambassador, and a guaranteed paid internship in a College of Engineering (COE) research lab or one of more than 100 companies. Qualitative and quantitative studies support the goal of determining how the program affects the students' engineering identities and their retention and graduation. The project team includes faculty in the various engineering disciplines, engineering education, and interdisciplinary social sciences. To improve the educational outcomes of other students in the UIC COE and to serve other engineering programs in the nation, the project results will be disseminated locally and nationally via newsletters, journal publications, professional conferences, and a dedicated website.