Early Engagement for Entering Freshman Science Majors

在美国国家科学基金会科学、技术、工程和数学奖学金(S-STEM)项目的资助下，该项目正在为低收入学生提供支持，这些学生有经济上的需求，而且学术上有希望在新奥尔良大学的STEM学科取得成功。该项目将在5年内为攻读计算机科学、化学和生物科学学士学位的学生提供18个奖学金。该项目将探索学习环境，以提高STEM专业在一个高度多样化的机构的坚持性和毕业率，努力增强美国STEM劳动力池。该项目的目标是通过提供全面的支持、参与活动和实习/研究网络来改善STEM学生的学术成果；通过指导和职业培训提高职业和研究生的成功；以及增强学生在科学领域从事职业的信心和准备。该项目的独特贡献来自于对校园内实施的新旧干预措施的组合进行测试，这将使研究团队能够推断出哪种干预措施对来自低收入但学术天赋背景的学生的坚持不懈和毕业最有效。该项目将利用几种策略来促进学生学者的成功，包括：(1)由教师导师、同伴导师和现有招生支持人员提供全面指导；(2)招收学生参加学生支持班的公共部分；(3)以灵活的方式提供全面的参与机会，包括学年丰富活动；(4)跟踪每个学生的进步，并将其与不在S-STEM项目中的类似学生的进步进行比较；以及(5)利用内部和外部形成性和总结性评估的结果，开发未来提高学生成功的模型。通过从向上的参与者中招募潜在的学者，来自低收入背景的当地高中生，以及来自其他地区的其他合格的入学新生，该项目将增加对该计划的组成部分如何对学生的坚持不懈和毕业产生最大影响的理解。

With funding from the National Science Foundation's Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (S-STEM) program, the "Early Engagement for Entering Freshman Science Majors" project is providing support to low-income students with demonstrated financial need and academic promise to succeed in STEM disciplines at the University of New Orleans. The project is funding 18 scholarships over 5 years for students who are pursuing bachelor's degrees in Computer Sciences, Chemistry, and Biological Sciences. This project will explore learning environments to increase the persistence and graduation rates of STEM majors at a highly diverse institution in an effort to enhance the US STEM workforce pool. The project goals are to improve academic outcomes for STEM students by providing a network of comprehensive support, engagement activities, and internships/research; to increase career and graduate school success through mentoring and career training; and to increase student confidence and preparedness to pursue a career in a scientific field. The unique contribution of this project arises from the testing of a combination of new and old interventions implemented on campus that will allow the research team to infer which work the best for persistence and graduation of students from low-income but academically talented backgrounds. This project will utilize several strategies to facilitate the success of the student scholars, including: (1) Providing comprehensive guidance by faculty mentors, peer mentors, and existing enrollment support staff; (2) Enrolling students in common sections of student support classes; (3) Providing comprehensive engagement opportunities in a flexible manner, including academic year enrichment activities; (4) Following the progress of each student and compare it with the progress of similar students not in the S-STEM program; and (5) Using the results of internal and external formative and summative evaluation to develop future models for improved student success. By recruiting prospective scholars from Upward Bound participants, local high school students from low income backgrounds, and other qualified entering freshmen from additional locations, this project will increase understanding of how components of this program might have the most effect on student persistence and graduation.