Scholarships and Support to Improve Retention and Graduation of Appalachian Community College Students in Math and Science

该项目将通过支持萨默塞特社区学院（Somerset Community College，位于肯塔基州阿巴拉契亚地区的一所两年制学院）中表现出经济需求的优秀低收入家庭学生的保留和毕业，来满足全国对受过良好教育的科学家、数学家、工程师和技术人员的需求。该项目为期五年，将为30名攻读生物、物理、化学、数学或预工程专业副学士学位的全日制和非全日制学生提供奖学金。学者将被录取为三组，并获得为期两年（一年级学生）或一年（转学生）的奖学金。该项目旨在通过在科学、技术、工程、STEM背景艺术和数学（STEAM）学习社区中创建紧密联系的学生群体，提高STEM学生的保留率和毕业率。这个学习社区将提供通识教育指导、课外活动和STEM教师的指导。该项目的招聘将侧重于吸纳在STEM领域代表性不足的群体，包括退伍军人、女性、少数民族、残疾人和非传统学生。为了提高项目的有效性，学院与其他机构的STEM相关企业和STEM教师合作，许多学院的学生都是从这些机构转学或转到这些机构。该项目旨在扩大其影响，包括学者的家庭和社区。该项目旨在提高肯塔基州中南部学生的教育程度，特别是在STEM领域。从该项目中吸取的经验教训将包括提高STEM教育成功率的战略知识，特别是在农村资源不足的社区。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。项目目标是：(1)提高学者的留存率和毕业率；(2)实施有效的循证策略；(3)研究实施策略的有效性。该项目的研究计划将增加有效策略的知识库，以提高来自资源不足的农村社区的社区大学STEM学生的成功。本研究将调查项目活动对提高学者的学业成功、坚持、保留、完成、学习转移和就业率的影响，与非学者和有资格进入S-STEM队列的历史学生相比。数据将被收集和分析，以确定哪些策略有助于学生的成功。这些数据还将与参与者的人口统计资料相关联，以评估项目活动支助不同人口群体的有效性。该项目有可能促进对教师指导和STEAM学习社区对农村低收入大学STEM学生的有效性的理解。该项目的成果将通过与高等教育和工业项目伙伴分享经验教训以及在国家教育期刊和会议上广泛传播。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 well-educated scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians by supporting the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students with demonstrated financial need at Somerset Community College, a two-year college in Appalachian Kentucky. Over its five-year duration, this project will provide scholarships to 30 unique full- and part-time students who are pursuing associate degrees in Biology, Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics, or Pre-Engineering. Scholars will be admitted in three cohorts and receive two-year (first year students) or one year (transfer students) scholarships. The project aims to improve the retention and graduation of STEM students by creating close-knit cohorts of students in a Science, Technology, Engineering, STEM-contextualized Arts, and Mathematics (STEAM) learning community. This learning community will provide general education instruction, co-curricular activities, and mentoring by STEM faculty. Recruitment for the project will focus on inclusion of groups tat are under-represented in STEM fields, including veterans, women, minorities, disabled, and non-traditional students. To increase the effectiveness of the project, the College has partnered with STEM-related businesses and STEM faculty at other institutions from which or to which many of the College’s students transfer. The project is designed to extend its impact to include the Scholars' families and communities. The project aims to improve the educational attainment, especially in STEM fields, of students from south-central Kentucky. Lessons learned from the project will include knowledge about strategies to improve success in STEM education, particularly in rural, under-resourced communities. The overall goal of this project is to increase STEM degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need. Project aims are to: (1) improve Scholars’ retention and graduation; (2) implement effective evidence-based strategies; and (3) research the effectiveness of the implemented strategies. The project's research plan will add to the knowledge base on effective strategies to improve the success of community college STEM students from rural, under-resourced communities. This research will investigate the effects of project activities on increasing Scholars’ academic success, persistence, retention, completion, transfer of learning, and employment rates compared to non-Scholars and historical students who would have qualified to be in the S-STEM cohort. Data will be collected and analyzed to determine which strategies aided student success. This data will also be correlated with participant demographics to assess the effectiveness of project activities for supporting different demographic groups. The project has the potential to advance understanding of the effectiveness of faculty mentoring and STEAM Learning Communities on rural, low-income college STEM students. The results of this project will be disseminated widely by sharing lessons learned with higher education and industry project partners, and in national educational journals and 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.