Collaborative Research: Expanding Access: Furthering a Network of Diversity-Focused Programs in the Physical Sciences

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This award supports the Access Network, a project aimed at substantially improving equity and inclusion in the physical sciences. Formed in 2014, Access is a national network that brings together nine programs that all leverage best practices for serving underrepresented students in Physics and other physical sciences. This award would expand the network from 9 to 15 sites and begin to scale up network activities by identifying and recruiting new sites (particularly from Minority Serving Institutions), building capacity within new sites through an "onboarding workshop", intensively mentoring new sites in their first year, maintaining existing Access Network activities to support a strong intersite-community, and planning and conducting internal and external evaluation to document successes and support sites' sustainability. These activities will enhance the capacity of the network to support both old and new sites, thus allowing the network to reach considerably more students in more effective ways.Access sites are modeled on the nationally-recognized Compass Project at UC Berkeley. Driven by a set of shared principles (e.g., student voice, authentic disciplinary engagement) and a suite of programmatic offerings (e.g., mentorship, model building courses, community events, early research opportunities), each site is tailored to the needs of its unique population, ranging from a large number of Deaf and hard of hearing students at the Rochester Institute of Technology to Black commuter students at Chicago State University. The network supports each site by providing relevant expertise, community support, mentored leadership opportunities, and a set of shared resources.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.