The AGEP Data Engineering and Science Alliance Model: Training and Resources to Advance Minority Graduate Students and Postdoctoral Researchers into Faculty Careers

这个合作研究项目将莱斯大学、德克萨斯南方大学和休斯顿大学联合起来，目标是开发、实施、研究、评估、传播、维持并有可能复制AGEP联盟模式，以支持和推动历史上代表性不足的少数族裔(URM)STEM博士后候选人和博士后研究人员进入数据工程与科学(DES)领域的教职。该项目采用了三管齐下的方法：为教师顾问和导师提供专业发展机会；在机构政策和程序中解决公平问题的活动；以及在对DES教师成功至关重要的关键知识和技能领域对URM研究生和博士后研究人员进行培训：研究、教学、创业、领导力和管理。这个AGEP DES联盟模式项目的目标成果包括：URM博士后候选人和博士后学者在DES领域的职业发展；制度改革，以改善URM博士生的留存，改善教师招聘实践的公平性，消除阻碍URM教师和博士后学者成功的系统性障碍；以及其他大学和学院复制AGEP DES联盟模式或具体干预的兴趣。AGEP DES联盟模式是为了响应NSF的研究生教育联盟和面向教授(AGEP)计划征集(NSF 16-552)而创建的。AGEP计划致力于增进有关模式的知识，以改善URM研究生、博士后研究员和教师在特定STEM学科和/或STEM教育研究领域获得教授和成功的途径。AGEP联盟通过综合教育和社会科学研究，开发、复制或复制、实施和研究AGEP联盟模式，以改变STEM和/或STEM教育研究职业中URM的博士教育、博士后培训和/或教师晋升的论文阶段，以及路径水平内部和跨路径的过渡。该联盟还由美国国家科学基金会的历史黑人学院和大学-本科项目(HBCU-UP)资助。随着国家解决URM与非URM本科生和研究生之间的STEM成就差距，我们的大学和学院努力招聘、留住和提升URM STEM教师，他们是URM学生学习、合作和效仿的榜样和学术领袖。NSF最近的报告显示，在所有四年制学院和大学中，URM STEM副教授和正教授只占这些高级教员职位的8%，在美国研究最密集的机构中，这些职位只占大约6%。AGEP DES联盟模式有可能推动一种模式的发展，以提高URM研究生和博士后研究人员进入教师职业生涯的成功。推进URM教师的职业生涯最终会改善对URM本科生在DES研究领域的学术指导。AGEP DES联盟模型团队正在进行的综合教育研究调查了有助于或阻碍URM STEM博士学位候选人坚持完成学位并在毕业后成功获得博士后或教师职位的因素。研究小组还在调查招聘程序可能包含偏见的方式，这些偏见阻碍了城市轨道交通应聘者的招聘。这项研究将为增进对URM STEM博士学位获得者和博士后研究人员竞争教师职位的高等教育背景的了解提供有价值的见解。AGEP DES联盟示范机构正在与一个外部评估员团队合作，他们正在进行形成性和终结性评估。该AGEP联盟还参与了四个委员会--AGEP DES联盟示范咨询委员会、机构执行领导委员会、研究咨询委员会和评价咨询委员会--向各机构和项目小组提供反馈，并对项目管理、综合研究项目以及模式的开发、执行、测试、评价、传播、可持续性和复制潜力提出调整建议。项目组通过在国家会议上发言和在专业期刊上发表同行评议的文章，传播研究成果以及他们在AGEP DES联盟模式的开发、实施、自学、评价、传播、可持续性和复制潜力方面的工作成果。此外，该联盟正在制作关于AGEP DES联盟模式和作为干预措施一部分使用的课程的视频和在线材料。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This collaborative research project brings together Rice University, Texas Southern University and the University of Houston, with the goal to develop, implement, study, evaluate, disseminate, sustain and potentially reproduce an AGEP Alliance Model to support and advance historically underrepresented minority (URM) STEM doctoral candidates and postdoctoral researchers into faculty positions in data engineering and science (DES) fields. The project employs a three-pronged approach: Professional development opportunities for faculty advisors and mentors; activities to address equity issues in institutional policies and procedures; and training for URM graduate students and postdoctoral researchers in key knowledge and skill areas that are essential to DES faculty member success: research, teaching, entrepreneurship, leadership and administration. The targeted outcomes of this AGEP DES Alliance Model project include the career advancement of URM doctoral candidates and postdoctoral scholars into faculty positions in DES fields; institutional changes to improve the retention of URM doctoral students, improve the equity of faculty hiring practices and remove systemic barriers to URM faculty and postdoctoral scholar success; and interest by other universities and colleges to reproduce the AGEP DES Alliance Model or specific interventions.The AGEP DES Alliance Model was created in response to the NSF's Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP) program solicitation (NSF 16-552). The AGEP program seeks to advance knowledge about models to improve pathways to the professoriate and success of URM graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and faculty in specific STEM disciplines and/or STEM education research fields. AGEP Alliances develop, replicate or reproduce, implement, and study, via integrated educational and social science research, AGEP Alliance Models to transform the dissertation phase of doctoral education, postdoctoral training and/or faculty advancement, and transitions within and across the pathway levels, of URMs in STEM and/or STEM education research careers. This Alliance is also funded by the NSF's Historically Black Colleges and Universities - Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP).As the nation addresses a STEM achievement gap between URM and non-URM undergraduate and graduate students, our universities and colleges struggle to recruit, retain and promote URM STEM faculty who serve as role models and academic leaders for URM students to learn from, work with and emulate. Recent NSF reports indicate that URM STEM associate and full professors occupy only 8% of these senior faculty positions at all four-year colleges and universities, and only about 6% of these positions at the nation's most research-intensive institutions. The AGEP DES Alliance Model has the potential to advance a model to improve the success of URM graduate students and postdoctoral researchers as they enter faculty careers. Advancing the careers of URM faculty ultimately leads to improved academic mentorship for URM undergraduate students in DES research fields.The integrated education research being conducted by the AGEP DES Alliance Model team investigates factors that help or hinder URM STEM doctoral degree candidates' persistence to degree completion and success in securing postdoctoral or faculty appointments upon graduation. The research team is also investigating ways that hiring procedures might contain bias that hinders the hiring of URM candidates. This research will provide valuable insights to advance knowledge about the higher education contexts in which URM STEM doctoral degree recipients and postdoctoral researchers compete for faculty positions.The AGEP DES Alliance Model institutions are working with a team of external evaluators who are conducting formative and summative evaluations. This AGEP Alliance also engages four boards - an AGEP DES Alliance Model Advisory Board, an institutional Executive Leadership Board, a Research Advisory Board, and an Evaluation Advisory Board - that provide feedback to the institutions and the project team, and that suggest adjustments to the project management, to the integrated research project and to the model development, implementation, testing, evaluation, dissemination, sustainability and reproduction potential. The project team is disseminating findings from research, and from their work on the AGEP DES Alliance Model's development, implementation, self-study, evaluation, dissemination, sustainability and reproduction potential, by presenting at national conferences and publishing peer-reviewed articles in professional journals. Additionally, the Alliance is creating video and on-line materials about the AGEP DES Alliance Model and about the curricula used as part of the interventions.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.