Planning: Track 1: Engineering WISE (Wellness through Integrated Support and Engagement)

这项规划补助金将允许为工程公平中心制定蓝图，工程智慧中心，这将推动肯塔基州（英国）工程学院（COE）的文化变革，通过综合支持和参与优先考虑健康。心理健康对传统上在工程学方面服务不足的学生产生了不同的影响。例如，性少数群体，第一代，黑人和拉丁裔学生认为，心理困难影响他们的学术比他们的工程同行更频繁。因此，我们必须推动文化变革，创造一个支持和公平的工程环境，优先考虑和支持学生的心理健康。该中心的使命声明是：创造公平和包容性的做法，旨在提高学生的福祉和提高归属感在一个COE。该中心将增加获得支持学生心理健康的资源，并确保学生收到关于他们的身份和挑战的积极信息。关系是实现这一目标的重要工具，这是为了帮助工程专业学生通过他们的工程培训和超越的多元化社区茁壮成长。虽然该中心将广泛影响所有工程专业的学生，活动将旨在改善心理健康和归属感的结果，为学生传统上在工程服务不足。此外，规划补助金将确保该中心的活动可转移到外部机构，包括那些服务于历史上不仅在工程，但更广泛的高等教育服务不足的学生。这项工作将深入了解如何为所有学生创造支持性和包容性的环境，让学生通过他们的工程训练和超越茁壮成长。这项规划补助金将开发，确定和完善工程公平中心的活动，重点是通过五个并行阶段支持学生的心理健康和健康：1）完善基于先前研究建立的中心活动，2）确定新的中心活动，3）将活动整合到现有的机构资源中，4）确保活动转移到外部机构，和5）收集基线数据并制定计划以评估中心结果。将与关键工程利益相关者（例如，学生，教师，管理人员），以确定工程中的心理健康问题，确定优先领域，并制定干预措施，融入未来的中心。教师和学生的访谈将有助于了解教师沟通如何积极（和消极）影响心理健康文化和归属感在课堂上。这将允许开发量身定制的和具体的通信培训工程教师是由工程学生的经验通知。最后，与学生，教师，工作人员和管理人员的焦点小组将指导中心结构，功能和品牌战略，以提高学生的参与度。一个内部咨询委员会将确保该中心的活动补充和整合现有的校园心理健康和健康资源。此外，外部咨询委员会由来自不同机构的教师组成，他们在学生心理健康研究方面有经验，并通过STEM为不同的学生提供支持途径。这个外部咨询委员会将确保为中心开发的活动满足学生的需求，这些学生在不同的机构环境中传统上在工程方面服务不足。该计划拨款将为工程WISE中心制定蓝图，该中心将最大限度地影响工程学中的心理健康文化（重点关注工程学服务不足的学生），这不仅在英国可行，而且在机构之外也是可行的。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力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 planning grant will allow for the development of a blueprint for a Center for Equity in Engineering, the Engineering WISE Center, that will drive cultural change in the College of Engineering (COE) at the University of Kentucky (UK) through prioritization of Wellness through Integrated Support and Engagement. Mental health differentially impacts students who are traditionally underserved in engineering. For instance, sexual minority, first generation, Black and Latinx students perceive that mental difficulties impact their academics more frequently than their engineering peers. Thus, we must drive cultural change to create a supportive and equitable engineering environment that prioritizes and supports student mental health. The Center Mission Statement is: to create equitable and inclusive practices aimed at enhancing student well-being and improving sense of belonging within a COE. The Center will increase access to resources that support student mental health and ensure students receive positive messages about their identities and challenges. Relationships are an important tool in meeting this goal, which is to help a diverse community of engineering students thrive through their engineering training and beyond. While the Center will broadly impact all engineering students, activities will be designed to improve mental health and sense of belonging outcomes for students traditionally underserved in engineering. Additionally, the planning grant will ensure that the Center activities are transferable to outside institutions, including those that serve students who are historically underserved not only in engineering but higher education more broadly. This work will provide insight into how to create supportive and inclusive environments for all students, allowing students to thrive through their engineering training and beyond.This planning grant will develop, identify and refine activities for a Center for Equity in Engineering focused around supporting student mental health and wellness through five concurrent stages: 1) Refine Center activities established based on prior research, 2) Identify novel Center activities, 3) Integrate activities into existing institutional resources, 4) Ensure transfer of activities to outside institutions, and 5) Collect baseline data and develop a plan to evaluate Center outcomes. Participatory research methods will be used with key engineering stakeholders (e.g., students, faculty, administrators) to define the problem of mental health in engineering, identify priority areas and develop interventions for integration into the future Center. Faculty and student interviews will facilitate understanding of how faculty communication can positively (and negatively) impact mental health culture and sense of belonging in the classroom. This will allow for the development of tailored and specific communication training for engineering faculty that is informed by the engineering student experience. Finally, focus groups with students, faculty, staff and administrators will guide strategies for Center structure, function and branding to enhance student engagement. An internal advisory board will ensure that the Center activities complement and integrate with existing campus mental health and wellness resources. Further, an external advisory board consists of faculty from diverse institutions with experience in research on student mental health and supporting pathways for diverse students through STEM. This external advisory board will ensure that activities developed for the Center meet the needs of students that are traditionally underserved in engineering across diverse institutional contexts. This planning grant will result in a blueprint for the Engineering WISE Center that will maximize impact on mental health culture in engineering (with a focus on students who are underserved in engineering) that is feasible not only at UK, but also outside institutions.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.