Improving First-to-Second Year Retention and Closing Equity Gaps through a STEM Academy

该项目旨在通过创建和试点一个新的STEM学院来提高西班牙裔学生的学术成果，该学院将为最初的学生群体提供财务，学术和社会支持的组合。这些支持最终有望增加STEM毕业生的数量和多样性。哥伦比亚盆地学院（Columbia Basin College）第一年STEM专业的学生流失率一直很高，特别是低收入、第一代和西班牙裔学生，只有一半多一点（54%）的学生坚持到第二年。通过新的STEM学院的发展，该项目将提高数学、科学和工程学院第一至第二年的保留率，并寻求缩小学校与西班牙裔学生的保留公平差距。STEM学院项目的目标是：1）将参与者第一年至第二年的保留率提高至少12%，2）将保留率公平差距减少至少50%。为此，项目团队将在试点年度开发一个新的、基于群组的STEM学院，招收25-35名学生。该学院的学生将获得支持，包括直接经济援助、相关课程的保留入学以及专门为STEM学生设计的新双语定向课程。 STEM学院的参与者还将受益于侵入性的学术咨询，与同行导师的合作关系，以及通过行业主导的STEM座谈会直接接触STEM专业人士。这些高影响力的做法是专门针对提高学生的归属感和自我效能感在干科目，这将提高学生的持久性，从第一年到第二年的关键过渡中学后教育。这将导致一个更大，更多样化的学生群体，他们将在学术上做好准备，以满足STEM劳动力日益增长的需求。 HSI计划旨在加强本科STEM教育，扩大STEM的参与，并建立HSI的能力。实现这些目标，考虑到HSI的多样性和背景，需要创新的方法来激励机构和社区转型，促进基础研究（i）参与学生学习，（ii）关于如何有效地多样化和增加STEM的参与，以及（iii）提高我们对如何在HSI建立机构能力的理解。HSI计划所支持的项目也将从这些方法中汲取经验，以产生关于如何实现这些目标的新知识。该奖项反映了NSF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 aims to improve academic outcomes for Hispanic students by creating and piloting a new STEM Academy which will offer a combination of financial, academic, and social supports to an initial cohort of students. Such supports are ultimately expected to result in an increase in the number and diversity of STEM graduates. Columbia Basin College has consistently had high levels of attrition for first year STEM majors, particularly for low-income, first generation, and Hispanic students, with only a little more than half (54%) of these students persisting into their second year. Through the development of the new STEM Academy, this project will increase first-to-second year retention rates in the School of Math, Science, and Engineering, and seek to close the school's retention equity gaps with respect to Hispanic students.The goals of the STEM Academy project are to: 1) increase participants’ first-to-second year retention by at least 12%, and 2) reduce the retention equity gap by at least 50%. Towards that end, the project team will develop a new, cohort-based STEM Academy of 25-35 students for the pilot year. Students in the Academy will receive supports including direct financial assistance, reserved enrollment in linked courses, and a new dual-language orientation course specifically designed for STEM students. STEM Academy participants will also benefit from intrusive academic advising, partnership with a peer mentor, and direct access to STEM professionals via an industry-led STEM colloquium. These high-impact practices are specifically geared toward increasing students’ sense of belonging and self-efficacy in STEM subjects, which will improve student persistence during the critical transition from the first year to the second year of their postsecondary education. This will result in a larger and more diverse body of students who will be academically prepared to meet the growing needs of the STEM workforce. The HSI Program aims to enhance undergraduate STEM education, broaden participation in STEM, and build capacity at HSIs. Achieving these aims, given the diverse nature and context of HSIs, requires innovative approaches that incentivize institutional and community transformation and promote fundamental research (i) on engaged student learning, (ii) about what it takes to diversify and increase participation in STEM effectively, and (iii) that improves our understanding of how to build institutional capacity at HSIs. Projects supported by the HSI Program will also draw from these approaches to generate new knowledge on how to achieve these aims.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.