NRT: Interdisciplinary Consortium for Applied Research in Ecology and Evolution (ICARE): Broadening Participation Across the Environmental Sciences in Baltimore Harbor

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This National Science Foundation Research Traineeship (NRT) award to the University of Maryland, Baltimore County will deliver an innovative training program designed to broaden participation in the environmental workforce and empower the next generation of scientists to apply research to environmental problem-solving. Focusing on the socio-ecological challenges facing Baltimore Harbor, the NRT project integrates (1) a cross-sector internship in which students conduct policy-relevant scientific research; (2) a series of skills-based courses to prepare students for the environmental workforce; and (3) professionally-facilitated interdisciplinary training sessions that engage students, mentors, and community stakeholders. The project anticipates training thirty (30) master's students, including eighteen (18) funded trainees from Biological Sciences, Geography and Environmental Systems, and Chemical, Biochemical and Environmental Engineering departments. An additional one hundred fifty (150) master's and doctoral students are expected to benefit from the courses developed and implemented through this program.The program will deliver a two-year, thesis-master's program to students from underrepresented groups that integrates (1) a series of skills-based courses, (2) interdisciplinary training with two, cumulative CoNavigator (an interdisciplinary problem-solving tool) training sessions, (3) an individually tailored curriculum of disciplinary courses, and (4) a cross-sector applied research internship. NRT activities will focus on the highly urbanized and industrialized Baltimore Harbor, which forms the basin of the Patapsco River and a major tributary embayment of the upper Chesapeake Bay. Though many of the Harbor's environmental issues are public knowledge, scientific literature on the health of the Harbor is surprisingly scant. Trainee research projects therefore will be advised by a team consisting of at least one faculty member and one professional scientist from industry, government, or the non-profit sector engaged in socioeconomic or environmental research in Baltimore Harbor. These off-campus partners will serve as research advisors and instructors for trainees in a two-way knowledge exchange that helps identify research needed for implementing new policies or evaluating existing policies to protect the Harbor. Additional community stakeholders will also participate in the interdisciplinary training sessions.The NSF Research Traineeship (NRT) Program is designed to encourage the development and implementation of bold, new potentially transformative models for STEM graduate education training. The program is dedicated to effective training of STEM graduate students in high priority interdisciplinary or convergent research areas through comprehensive traineeship models that are innovative, evidence-based, and aligned with changing workforce and research needs.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.