IGE: Advancing and Strengthening Science Identity through Systematic Training (ASSIST)

从拉丁美洲人、非洲裔美国人和妇女等代表性不足的少数民族研究生群体中培养科学领袖仍然是国家的优先事项。然而，这些群体面临的成功障碍往往不能通过传统的指导和科学专业化方法得到充分解决。为少数民族服务的机构具有独特的优势，可以培养多样化的科学领导者，但它们也需要一种系统的、综合的、全项目的方法，以培养和验证学生作为科学家的身份。德克萨斯大学圣安东尼奥的国家科学基金会研究生教育创新奖（IGE）通过将整体指导与科学写作和公共科学传播的系统培训相结合来培养科学身份。该计划将测试一种创新和潜在的变革模式，使科学多样化，使环境科学与生态学系的教师和研究生以社区支持，全面和系统的方法参与其中。该项目将利用一系列研究生课程、专业讲习班和基于社区的活动，以促进和验证代表性不足的少数民族学生的科学身份。在全国范围内，这些干预措施可能存在非正式的，但他们很少，如果有的话，完全融入一个连贯的研究生STEM计划。培养科学专业的多元化领导者至关重要，因为科学家在全球化和媒体饱和的世界中应对跨学科知识需求和文化挑战。该IGE项目的目标是通过获得知识基础（能力），执行科学实践的能力（表现）以及该领域其他重要人员的认可（认可），为代表性不足的少数民族研究生培养科学身份。研究人员提出，培养这些身份组成部分，并使它们在科学学科和公共社区可见，可以通过三个相互关联的干预措施来实现：整体指导，写作学习科学和公共科学传播。课堂内外的全面辅导将提供必要的基本框架，以解决代表性不足的少数民族学生所面临的需求和挑战。此外，该项目假设，全面的指导转化为机会，以验证学生的科学能力和领导技能的研究为基础的科学写作和公共科学传播的系统培训的挑战。该项目将使用混合方法评估方法，不仅分析每项干预措施，而且分析所有三项干预措施之间的关系。因此，它试图提供一个基于证据的验证的影响，全面的辅导和系统的通信培训培养科学的民族精神，为代表性不足的少数民族研究生。研究生教育创新（IGE）计划的重点是研究生教育的研究。 IGE的目标是试验、测试和验证研究生教育的创新方法，并产生将这些方法推广到更广泛的社区所需的知识。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估来支持。

Developing science leaders from underrepresented minority graduate student groups such as Latinos, African Americans, and women remains a national priority. Yet the barriers to success these groups face are often not adequately addressed by traditional methods of mentoring and professionalization in science. Minority-serving institutions are uniquely poised to foster diverse science leaders, but they also require a systematic, integrated, program-wide approach geared toward nurturing and validating students' identities as scientists. This National Science Foundation Innovations in Graduate Education (IGE) award to the University of Texas San Antonio cultivates science identity by integrating holistic mentoring with systematic training in science writing and public science communication. This program will test an innovative and potentially transformative model for diversifying science that engages both faculty and graduate students from the department of Environmental Science and Ecology in a community-supported, holistic, and systematic approach. The project will utilize a series of graduate courses, professional workshops, and community-based activities that seek to foster and validate underrepresented minority students' science identity. Nationally, these interventions may exist informally, but they are rarely, if ever, fully integrated into a coherent graduate STEM program. Developing diverse leaders in science professions is crucial as scientists navigate interdisciplinary knowledge demands and cultural challenges in a globalized and media-saturated world. The goal of this IGE project is to cultivate a science identity for underrepresented minority graduate students through the acquisition of a knowledge base (competence), the ability to perform science practices (performance), and the acknowledgement by significant others in the field (recognition). The researchers propose that fostering these identity components and making them visible in scientific disciplines and public communities can be achieved through three interrelated interventions: holistic mentoring, writing-to-learn science, and public science communication. Holistic mentoring, both in and outside the classroom environment will provide the underlying framework necessary to address the needs and challenges faced by underrepresented minority students. In addition, this project hypothesizes that holistic mentoring transforms the challenges of systematic training in research-based science writing and public science communication into opportunities to validate students' scientific competence and leadership skills. The project will use a mixed-methods assessment approach to analyze not only each intervention but also on the relationships among all three interventions. Therefore, it seeks to provide an evidence-based validation of the impact of holistic mentoring and systematic communications training on cultivating a scientific ethos for underrepresented minority graduate students. The Innovations in Graduate Education (IGE) program is focused on research in graduate education. The goals of IGE are to pilot, test and validate innovative approaches to graduate education and to generate the knowledge required to move these approaches into the broader community.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.