Promoting Opportunities and Pathways for Undergraduate Persistence in Science, Engineering, Technology, and Mathematics

该项目将有助于国家需要受过良好教育的科学家，数学家，工程师和技术人员通过支持高成就，低收入学生的保留和毕业证明在奥古斯塔大学的经济需要。 奥古斯塔大学是格鲁吉亚的四所公立综合研究型大学之一，学生群体高度多样化，特别是在STEM专业，三分之二是女性，近一半来自科学代表性不足的群体。 在五年的时间里，该项目将为30名攻读生物科学、化学、数学和/或物理学学士学位的学生提供三年奖学金。 该项目旨在通过研讨会为学生的成长和发展提供独特的学习机会，重点是提高STEM的持久性，提高个人和学术技能，并提高职业意识。 预计研讨会将帮助学生发展不经常融入STEM课程的重要技能。 研讨会还应激发学生对STEM的兴趣和自我效能。 包括同行，教师和专业导师的指导计划将为学者提供学术和职业指导网络。 一个学习社区将通过提供一个建立强烈的社区意识的环境来补充辅导计划和讲习班。 该项目将支持STEM教师参与正在进行的专业发展，从而促进所有学生的正式STEM学习的显着改善。该项目的目的是，学者将毕业于STEM劳动力成功所需的关键技能和动力。该项目将为本科生在STEM教育和职业轨道上的持续性提供新的知识，包括来自STEM代表性不足的人群的学生的持续性。 该项目的总体目标是提高具有经济需求的高成就本科生的STEM学位完成率。 机构数据表明，对于相当多的学生来说，他们成功攻读STEM学位的障碍并不是因为学术能力较低。该项目旨在解决成功的潜在非学术障碍，包括经济障碍，兴趣丧失和/或职业意识有限，STEM自我效能低和课堂学习环境。 该项目的组成部分旨在：a）积极影响学生的自我效能，包括STEM自我效能; B）刺激和支持对STEM学习课程和STEM职业的持续兴趣; c）通过战略指导计划和学习社区创造归属感; d）提高STEM课堂教学的质量。 通过研讨会进行的早期干预将侧重于提高学生对STEM职业和学习课程的兴趣，并帮助学生在跨学科，低风险的社会环境中获得宝贵的技能。将使用混合方法研究设计来确定项目各个方面的有效性，从而更好地了解影响STEM持久性的因素。 该项目的总体效果将使用学生保留率和毕业率来衡量。 学生的兴趣，STEM自我效能和归属感也将使用经过验证的调查工具进行评估。 定量数据将与从学生和教师焦点小组获得的定性数据进行三角分析，以深入了解哪些项目举措对学生坚持STEM的影响最大。 该项目的成果将通过在科学会议上介绍、在同行评审的期刊上发表和在项目网站上张贴等方式向科学界传播。 该项目由NSF的科学，技术，工程和数学奖学金计划资助，该计划旨在增加低收入学术人才的数量，这些学生表现出经济需求，并获得STEM领域的学位。它还旨在改善未来STEM工作者的教育，并产生关于低收入学生的学术成功，保留，转移，毕业和学术/职业道路的知识。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 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 Augusta University. Augusta University is one of four public comprehensive research universities in Georgia, with a highly diverse student population, especially in STEM majors where two-thirds are female and nearly half are from groups underrepresented in science. Over its five-year duration, this project will fund three-year scholarships to 30 students who are pursuing bachelor's degrees in Biological Sciences, Chemistry, Mathematics, and/or Physics. The project seeks to provide unique learning opportunities for student growth and development through workshops focused on improving persistence in STEM, enhancing personal and academic skills, and increasing career awareness. It is expected that the workshops will help students develop important skills that are not often integrated into STEM courses. The workshops should also stimulate student interest and self-efficacy in STEM. A mentoring program that includes peer, faculty, and professional mentors will provide Scholars with a network of academic and career guidance. A Learning Community will complement the mentoring program and workshops by providing an environment to build a strong sense of community. The project will support STEM faculty engagement in ongoing professional development, thus facilitating significant improvement of formal STEM learning for all students. The project intends that Scholars will graduate with critical skills and motivation needed for success in the STEM workforce. This project will contribute new knowledge about the persistence of undergraduates in STEM educational and career tracks, including the persistence of students from populations that are underrepresented in STEM. The overall goal of this project is to increase STEM degree completion of high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need. Institutional data suggest that, for a significant number of students, the obstacles to their successful pursuit of a STEM degree do not result from lower academic capabilities. This project seeks to address potential non-academic obstacles to success, including financial obstacles, loss of interest and/or limited career awareness, low STEM self-efficacy, and the classroom learning environment. The project components are intentionally designed to: a) positively impact student self-efficacy, including STEM self-efficacy; b) stimulate and support a sustained interest in STEM courses of study and STEM careers, c) create a sense of belonging through a strategic mentoring program and a learning community; and d) improve the quality of STEM classroom instruction. Early interventions via workshops will focus on increasing students' interest in STEM careers and courses of study and helping students gain valuable skills in an interdisciplinary, low-stakes social environment. A mixed methods research design will be used to determine the effectiveness of each aspect of the project, leading to a better understand factors that influence persistence in STEM. The overall effectiveness of the project will be measured using student retention and graduation rates. Student interest, STEM self-efficacy, and sense of belonging will also be assessed using validated survey instruments. Quantitative data will be triangulated with qualitative data obtained from student and faculty focus groups to provide insight into which project initiatives had the most significant impact on student persistence in STEM. The results of the project will be disseminated to the scientific community by presentations in scientific conferences, publication in peer-reviewed journals, and posting on the project website. 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.