Kansas Bridges to the Future

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DESCRIPTION (provided by the applicant): Kansas is becoming a diverse state with greater percentages of Hispanics in the southwest part of the state, and increasing African-Americans in the Eastern part. Many of the community colleges are the first choice of underrepresented minorities in pursuing their higher education goals, and many are first generation college bound students. Three of the community colleges located in southwest Kansas, with which Kansas State University (KSU) proposes to partner, have a high Hispanic enrollment. Two of the community colleges in the Kansas City, Kansas area have a high percentage of African-American students. KSU proposes to partner with these 5 community colleges to identify, mentor and guide minority students with potential into biomedical careers. Students identified for the Bridges program will receive dual admission to the community college land to KSU with tuition waivers. We propose a grassroots effort beginning at the community college level to develop biomedical career awareness, enhance the academic preparation skills of selected Bridges students, seek parental involvement, and devote resources to the community colleges to allow for sufficient academic advisement of these students. A short one-week summer institute will make Bridge students aware of scientific investigation and opportunities after their freshman year. After the second year, Bridges students will have the opportunity to work for 8 weeks at KSU in the laboratory of a scientific investigator. Community college instructors will also be given an opportunity to work at a KSU laboratory for an 8 week summer period to help bridge gaps in research training and curriculum development. All students will be prepared in a rigorous foundation of science, chemistry and math to help assure their later success at a 4 year institution. Students will be awarded a work stipend to enable them to work as research assistants for 2 years under KSU's Developing Scholars Program. The overall goal is to increase the number of Kansas minority students pursuing PhDs or MD-PhDs in the biomedical field.