Implementation Project: Increasing Degree Production through STEM Entrepreneurship and Career Development Activities

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Implementation Projects in the Historically Black Colleges and Universities - Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP) provide support to design, implement, study and assess comprehensive institutional efforts to increase the numbers of students and the quality of their preparation by strengthening science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education and research. This implementation project at Harris-Stowe State University (HSSU), a small, public, open-access HBCU, provides a multilayered approach to broaden opportunities for African-American students to succeed in STEM majors. The project has a strong focus on STEM careers and workforce development pathways to provide students with entrepreneurial competencies and skills that are adaptive and flexible enough to respond competitively to changing STEM workforce needs as well as graduate school preparation. The project is guided and informed by an on-going evaluation and a research study, as well as by internal and external advisory committees.The project builds on two very successful previous implementation projects that established STEM programs at the university. It will implement a variety of activities designed to instill an entrepreneurial mindset, introduce real world STEM experiences and build important non-cognitive skill sets for STEM students with the goal to increase retention, graduation and graduate school or workforce readiness. This will be accomplished by the objectives to: introduce reimagined curriculum and co-curricular activities designed to expand students' understanding of STEM career paths and introduce and promote an entrepreneurial mindset and skills; have activities to onboard cohorts of students that transfer to HSSU from community colleges; and promote cognitive and noncognitive skills critical for success in the contemporary STEM workforce or graduate school. This project promises to have wide-reaching broader impacts at the university and in the surrounding 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.