Building Exceptional Talent in Engineering and Computing in the Utah Valley

该项目将为国家对受过良好教育的科学家、数学家、工程师和技术人员的需求做出贡献，为留住和毕业在犹他州山谷大学(UVU)表现出经济需求的高成就、低收入学生提供支持。在为期6年的时间里，该项目将为36名正在攻读电气工程、计算机工程、计算机科学和软件工程学位的学生提供奖学金。在工程和计算领域培养杰出人才(BE-TEC)计划将推进犹他州的工程和计算机科学计划，帮助培养高素质的STEM劳动力，并加强一所大型开放招生大学的STEM计划。该项目将通过向低收入、学业有天赋的学生提供奖学金，从大一开始向有经济需求的低收入学生提供长达四年的奖学金，以促进学生的成功和学位完成。奖学金获得者将得到基于证据的高影响力活动的支持，包括意向性教师指导、专业实习、合作设计项目、领导力机会和高级顶峰项目。BE-TEC正在加强一所开放招生大学的能力，该大学的学生人数与研究型机构的学生人数明显不同，以吸引、留住和研究生工程和计算机专业的学生，并为他们为STEM专业做出贡献做好准备。该项目旨在改善STEM教育渠道中从体制上确定的几个消耗点，包括完成工作的时间过长、兼职工作过多、辍学率高以及妇女、少数群体和第一代学生的参与率和毕业率低。该项目将通过UVU广泛的、国家支持的双重招生计划和低收入服务夏季桥梁计划进行广泛的招聘。参加“我是第一”和三重学生支持服务(SSS--面向低收入和第一代学生)计划的本科生也将成为招聘目标。计划中的BE-TEC活动的协同作用有可能促进个别学生的变革性体验，并帮助培养一支具有技术和软技能的有才华的劳动力队伍，以满足区域和国家的需求。该项目由NSF的科学、技术、工程和数学奖学金项目资助，该项目旨在增加在STEM领域获得学位的低收入学术天才学生的数量。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业成功、留住、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优势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 Utah Valley University (UVU). Over its 6-year duration, this project will provide scholarships to 36 students who are pursuing degrees in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Computer Science, and Software Engineering. The Building Exceptional Talent in Engineering & Computing (BE-TEC) program will advance Utah’s Engineering and Computer Science Initiative, contribute to a high-quality STEM workforce, and strengthen STEM programs at a large, open-admissions university. The project will promote student success and degree completion by providing scholarships to low-income, academically talented students with demonstrated financial need for up to four years, beginning in their freshman year. Scholarship recipients will be supported by evidence-based high impact activities, including intentional faculty mentoring, professional internships, collaborative design projects, leadership opportunities, and senior capstone projects. BE-TEC is enhancing the capability of an open-enrollment university with a markedly different student population from those at research-focused institutions to attract, retain, and graduate students in engineering and computing and prepare them to contribute to their STEM professions. The project aims to ameliorate several institutionally identified attrition points in the STEM educational pipeline, including excessive time to completion, excessive part-time work, a high dropout rate, and low participation and completion rates of women, minorities, and first-generation students. The project will recruit broadly through UVU’s extensive, state-supported, dual-enrollment programs and its low-income serving summer-bridge programs. Enrolled undergraduates in the "I Am First" and TRIO Student Support Services (SSS – for low-income and first-generation students) programs will also be targets for recruitment. The synergy of planned BE-TEC activities has the potential of facilitating transformative experiences for individual students and of helping prepare a talented workforce with the technical and soft skills to meet regional and national needs. 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.