Supporting the Graduation of Transfer Students Pursuing Bachelor's Degrees in Mathematics, Computer, and Natural Sciences

该项目将通过支持雅典州立大学的优秀低收入学生的保留和毕业，为国家对高技能科学家、数学家、工程师和技术人员的需求做出贡献。这所大学是一所专门招收转校生的高年级大学，其中大多数是成人学习者。在为期四年的时间里，该项目将为30-45名攻读生物学、化学、计算机科学、信息技术或数学学士学位的全日制或半全日制转校生提供奖学金。这些学者将获得两到四年的奖学金支持，这取决于他们是全日制还是半日制课程。为了促进学位的完成，奖学金支持将与其他支持相结合，包括结构化的教师指导、使用笔记本电脑和在线辅导服务、队列和同伴支持活动、以研究和职业准备为重点的基于项目的学习机会，以及一个将参与者与同伴和社区导师联系起来的在线学习社区。该项目有可能促进对STEM领域转学生和成人学习者最有效的支持举措的理解。这些信息可能适用于四年制大学的STEM转校生。雅典州立大学拥有大量低收入家庭的学生，位于亨茨维尔都会区的科技中心。因此，该项目可以提供完成学位的途径，扩大低收入，成绩优异的学生进入区域STEM职业的机会。该项目的总体目标是提高有经济需求的低收入、高成就本科生的STEM学位完成率。具体的项目目标是通过(1)财政援助和获得关键技术，(2)基于项目的学习机会（包括研究和基于工作的学习），(3)同伴支持，以及(4)教师和社区指导，提高STEM领域有学术天赋的低收入转学学生的招聘、保留、学业成功和毕业率。虽然专门针对转学生和成人学习者的支持计划已被证明可以提高学生的成功，但需要更多的研究来确定哪种类型的支持在提高STEM领域的成功方面最有效。由于雅典州立大学是一所只接受转学的机构，因此该项目具有独特的定位，可以确定有助于转学学生在STEM领域取得成功的具体因素。该项目将调查特定的支持结构是否以及在多大程度上促进学业成功。为此，它将使用有关招生、留校和毕业率的机构数据，以及Scholar调查的结果。该项目的总体成果预计将是加深对支持STEM专业转学生的有效方法的理解，并增加边缘化人群获得STEM职业的机会。一个外部委员会将对项目实施和有效性进行年度形成性评价，并在项目结束时进行总结性评价。该项目的成果将通过同行评议期刊的出版物和在地方、区域和国家会议上的报告加以传播。该项目由美国国家科学基金会的科学、技术、工程和数学奖学金项目资助，旨在增加有经济需求的低收入学术天才学生在STEM领域获得学位的人数。它还旨在改善未来STEM工作者的教育，并为低收入学生提供有关学业成功、留校、转学、毕业和学术/职业道路的知识。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。

This project will contribute to the national need for highly skilled scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students at Athens State University. This University is an upper-division university that exclusively serves transfer students, most of whom are adult learners. Over its four-year duration, the project will fund scholarships to 30-45 different full- or half-time transfer students who are pursuing bachelor’s degrees in Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Information Technology, or Mathematics. These Scholars will receive two to four years of scholarship support, depending on whether they are taking courses full or half-time. To facilitate degree completion, scholarship support will be coupled with other supports, including structured faculty mentorship, access to laptops and online tutoring services, cohort and peer support activities, project-based learning opportunities focused on research and career preparation, and an online learning community that connects participants with peers and community mentors. This project has the potential to advance understanding of the support initiatives that are most effective for transfer students and adult learners in STEM fields. Such information may be generalizable to STEM transfer students at four-year institutions. Athens State University has a high population of low-income students and is located within the science and technology hub of the Huntsville Metro Area. Consequently, this project can provide a pathway to degree completion that expands access of low-income, high-achieving students to regional STEM careers.The overall goal of this project is to increase STEM degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need. The specific project goals are to improve recruitment, retention, academic success, and graduation rates of academically talented, low-income transfer students in STEM fields through (1) financial assistance and access to critical technology, (2) project-based learning opportunities (including research and work-based learning), (3) peer support, and (4) faculty and community mentoring. Although support initiatives that specifically target transfer students and adult learners have been shown to generally increase student success, more research is needed to determine which types of support are the most effective at increasing success in STEM fields. Because Athens State University is a transfer-only institution, this project is uniquely positioned to identify specific factors contributing to the success of transfer students in STEM fields. The project will investigate whether and to what extent specific support structures increase academic success. To do so, it will use institutional data about recruitment, retention, and graduation rates, along with the results of Scholar surveys. The overall outcomes of the project are expected to be an increased understanding of effective ways to support transfer students in STEM majors and an increase in access to STEM careers for marginalized populations. An external committee will conduct yearly formative evaluations of project implementation and effectiveness and will also conduct a summative evaluation at the end of the project. Results of this project will be disseminated through publications in peer-reviewed journals and presentations at local, regional, and national conferences. This project is funded by NSF’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, which seeks to increase the number of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need who earn degrees in STEM fields. It also aims to improve the education of future STEM workers, and to generate knowledge about academic success, retention, transfer, graduation, and academic/career pathways of low-income students.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.