Collaborative Research: Scaling the Early Research Scholars Program

在全国范围内，计算机科学（CS）课程的注册人数比以往任何时候都要高，但两个关键问题仍然存在。首先，尽管入学率很高，但继续读研究生的美国学生相对较少。保持和提高国内博士培养队伍的健康发展是大学、公司和政府机构关注的问题。其次，攻读计算机科学学位的学生人数并不能代表美国人口的多样性，女性和其他群体的人数一直不足。早期研究学者计划（ERSP）旨在解决增加博士学位管道和扩大计算机科学领域参与的问题。ERSP是一个学年的、基于团队的研究学徒计划，特别强调在CS专业的第二年指导女性和代表性不足的群体。ERSP的指导框架包括研究导师和ERSP中心指导团队，为每个学生提供多方面的支持。此外，它的结构吸引了大量的早期CS学生在一个富有成效的，积极的CS研究经验，而不会对个人研究顾问施加不必要的工作。通过让学生参与早期研究，ERSP旨在提高他们在本科阶段的留用率，并招收他们进入研究生课程。这个项目已经在加州大学圣地亚哥分校成功运行了四年。该项目将把ERSP扩展到其他大学，包括斯坦福大学、加州大学圣巴巴拉分校和伊利诺伊大学芝加哥分校。该项目还将研究ERSP对所有院校学生和教师参与者的影响。本项目分为两个部分：ERSP的扩展和评价ERSP对参与者的影响。初期，该计划将在三所研究密集的学院推行，并设有一系列的本科生入学标准。每次实施都将根据机构的具体情况进行调整，提供一系列实施结构作为如何成功实施ERSP的模型。在最初的扩展阶段之后，该项目计划与另外两所学校合作，探索如何在研究强度较低的大学（例如硕士院校）实施ERSP。该项目的第二部分是研究ERSP对学生参与者的长期影响。具体而言，该项目旨在评估ERSP是否促进了参与者的以下方面：与计算机社区的联系感、短期和长期参与研究、计算机科学知识和对计算机的坚持。研究管道评估中心的评估人员将利用他们的国家调查基础设施，收集ERSP学生与非ERSP学生在大学期间和毕业后的经验数据。这些评估人员还将与ERSP项目负责人、教师导师和学生进行面谈，并控制未参加ERSP的教师和学生。这些访谈将补充调查数据，并帮助ERSP团队更好地了解ERSP的影响，以及确定项目改进的新挑战和机会。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并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，被认为值得支持。

Enrollment in computer science (CS) programs across the nation is higher than ever, yet two critical problems persist. First, despite these high enrollments, relatively few U.S. students are continuing on to graduate school. Maintaining and improving the health of the domestic Ph.D. pipeline is a concern of universities, companies, and government agencies. Second, the population of students pursuing CS degrees is not representative of the diversity of people in the U.S., with women and other groups persistently underrepresented. The Early Research Scholars Program (ERSP) aims to address issues of increasing the Ph.D. pipeline and broadening participation in computer science fields. ERSP is an academic-year, team-based research apprenticeship program that places special emphasis on mentoring women and underrepresented groups in the second year of the CS major. ERSP's mentoring framework includes the research mentor and the ERSP central mentoring team, providing multifaceted support for each student. In addition, it is structured to engage a large number of early CS students in a productive, positive CS research experience without imposing undue work on individual research advisors. By engaging students in early research, ERSP aims to increase their retention at the undergraduate level and recruitment into graduate programs. The project has been running successfully at University of California San Diego for four years. This project will expand ERSP to other universities, including Stanford University, the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the University of Illinois at Chicago. The project will also study the outcomes of ERSP on the student and faculty participants at all institutions. This project has two parts: expansion of ERSP and evaluation of the impact of ERSP on participants. Initially, ERSP will be implemented at three research-intensive schools with a range of undergraduate admission criteria. Each implementation will be tailored to the specific context of the institution, providing a range of implementation structures as models for how ERSP might be successfully implemented. After this initial expansion phase, the project plans to partner with two additional schools to explore how ERSP could be implemented at less research-intensive universities (e.g., masters institutions). The second part of this project is research on the long-term impact of ERSP on student participants. Specifically, the project seeks to assess whether ERSP promotes the following among participants: a sense of connection with the computing community, short-term and long-term engagement in research, CS knowledge, and persistence in computing. Evaluators at the Center for Evaluating the Research Pipeline will use their national survey infrastructure to collect experiential data from ERSP students vs. non-ERSP students, as the students progress through college and after they leave college. These evaluators will also conduct interviews with ERSP program leaders, faculty mentors, and students, and control faculty and students who are not participating in ERSP. These interviews will supplement the survey data, and help the ERSP team better understand ERSP impact, as well as identify new challenges and opportunities for program improvement.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.