A Socio-Technical Approach to Solve Grand Societal Challenges: Engineering Design and Innovation Scholars Program

该项目将有助于对受过良好教育的科学家，数学家，工程师和技术人员的国家需要，通过支持高成就，低收入学生的保留和毕业，证明在布法罗（UB）工程和应用科学学院（SEAS）的大学经济需要。UB是纽约州的一所公立研究型大学。在五年的时间里，该项目将为30名攻读工程或计算机科学本科和硕士（MS）学位的全日制学生提供奖学金和支持服务。一年级本科生将获得四年奖学金，MS学生将获得两年奖学金。该项目将引入人性化的方法来应对重大的社会挑战，如获得医疗保健，获得清洁的空气和水，以及获得技术。该项目将展示学生如何使用工程设计以及他们的工程和计算机科学知识和技能，使世界成为每个人生活的更美好的地方。该项目将建立一个学习社区，提供研究工程和计算机科学的社会影响的课程，并与教师和社区合作伙伴一起提供指导，专业发展，体验式学习和研究机会。这些活动将与现有的支持活动和新的社会影响夏季研究计划相结合，以促进学术成功和保留。该项目的研究重点将阐明队列建设，指导，研究和学术服务如何支持低收入学生在工程和计算机科学的保留和毕业。该项目的总体目标是通过建立一个包容，基于队列的学习社区专注于工程和计算机科学的社会重大挑战问题。该研究计划探讨了这种对学术整合，研究参与和支持服务的关注是否会增加学生在学术社区的归属感和保留感。该项目还将展示对MS学生的支持如何改善就业前景，或作为国内低收入学生获得博士学位的桥梁。预计该项目还将增加所有参与者对实践/行动/社区研究项目的积极参与，补充传统的讲座教学。社会技术研究经验可能会在留住这些学生的努力中发挥作用。参加社会影响研究计划的学生将增加他们的心理社会因素，随后他们的学业成功的可能性将被调查。该项目有可能促进我们对社会技术如何关注重大社会挑战的理解，以增加STEM学科中代表性不足的群体的学生的保留。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 the University at Buffalo (UB) School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS). UB is a public research university in the State of New York. Over its five-year duration this project will fund scholarships and provide support services to thirty unique full-time students who are pursuing undergraduate and master’s (MS) degrees in engineering or computer science. First year undergraduates will receive four-year scholarships and MS students will receive 2-year scholarships. The project will introduce a humanistic approach to addressing grand societal challenges such as access to healthcare, access to clean air and water, and accessibility to technology. The project will demonstrate the ways students can use engineering design and their engineering and computer science knowledge and skills to make the world a better place for everyone to live. The project will establish a learning community, offer courses that study the societal impacts of engineering and computer science, and provide mentoring, professional development, experiential learning and research opportunities with faculty and community partners. These activities will be integrated with existing support activities and a new Social Impact Summer Research Program to foster academic success and retention. The project research focus will elucidate how cohort building, mentoring, research, and academic services support retention and graduation of low-income students in engineering and computer science.The overall goal of the project is to increase degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates in STEM fields by establishing an inclusive, cohort-based learning community focused on issues of societal grand challenges in engineering and computer science. The research program explores whether this focus on academic integration, research engagement, and support services increases students’ sense of belonging and retention in their academic community. The project will also demonstrate how support for MS students can improve job prospects or act as a bridge to the PhD for domestic low-income students. It is expected that the project will also increase the active engagement of all participants in hands-on/action/community-based research projects, supplementing traditional lecture-based teaching. Socio-technical research experiences may play a role in the effort to retain these students. The possibility that students who participate in the social impact research program will increase their psycho-social factors and subsequently their academic success will be investigated. The project has the potential to advance our understanding of how a socio-technical focus on grand societal challenges can increase the retention of students from groups underrepresented in STEM disciplines. 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.