Nebraska STEM Scholars: Improving Student Success through Scholarship and Support Services

内布拉斯加州 STEM 学者：通过奖学金和支持服务提高学生的成功

• 批准号: 2130142
• 负责人: Danielle Peekenschneider
• 金额: $ 75万
• 依托单位: Wayne State College
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2022-02-01 至 2028-01-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2130142&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Nebraska; STEM; Scholars; Improving; Student

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 Wayne State College (WSC). WSC is a four-year, rural, public college in located northeastern Nebraska. It is part of the Nebraska state college system and serves approximately 4,200 students. WSC's vision is to make a notable difference in rural and community life through learning excellence and student success. Following an aim of the Rural STEM Education Research Act passed by the House of Representatives in May, 2021, the project will be uniquely positioned to increase the capacity of rural northeastern Nebraska to provide quality STEM education and STEM workforce development programming to students. In particular, over its 6-year duration, this project will fund 4-year scholarships to 18 distinct talented, low-income students from rural communities (3 different cohorts of 6 students each) majoring in biology, chemistry, or mathematics. In addition to financial support, students will be provided with comprehensive curricular and co-curricular support opportunities aimed at reducing and removing barriers to STEM success and degree completion. At the initial stage, students will be able to attend a “Succeeding in the Sciences Week” prior to the start of their freshman year to prepare them for the rigors of a STEM education and begin to build a sense of community among their cohort scholar group. Additional support opportunities will include community volunteering, faculty mentoring, internships, on campus living for 2 years, participation and presentations at scientific conferences, special career counseling, supplemental instruction, and faculty mentoring to help students identify and conduct research projects. As another component of the project, faculty will be able to attend a Faculty Mobile Summer Institute, which will provide training in evidence-based teaching methods. Project investigators will disseminate outcomes and findings related to project challenges and successes, especially to other small public rural institutions striving to support low-income STEM students.To increase STEM degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need, the project will pursue several goals. First is to remove financial barriers and to adapt, implement, and analyze a comprehensive set of evidence-based strategies to build capacity to support, retain, and graduate the project's rural biology, chemistry, and mathematics scholars. Second is to enhance the regional STEM workforce by providing special career preparation opportunities for students to prepare them to contribute through employment or pursuit of advanced degrees. Third is to contribute to the knowledge base by implementing, testing, and studying through project evaluation strategies for systematically supporting student academic and career pathways in STEM. And fourth is to disseminate outcomes and findings related to the supports and interventions that promote student success to other institutions working to support talented, low-income STEM students. Aimed at addressing the goals, project evaluation is designed to employ qualitative and quantitative methods to provide insights into the efficacy of project strategies to provide formative and summative feedback to the project and to identify the effective ones for replication, especially in other rural settings. Related to this, the directions of investigation will address gaps in the literature and strengthen the knowledge base on impactful and practical interventions unique to rural, first-generation, low-income, academically talented students. 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.

该项目将通过支持韦恩州立学院（WSC）表现出的高分，低收入学生的保留和毕业，以支持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求。 WSC是位于内布拉斯加州东北部的四年制公立大学。它是内布拉斯加州州立大学系统的一部分，为大约4200名学生提供服务。 WSC的愿景是通过学习卓越和学生的成功来对艰难和社区生活产生显着影响。在2021年5月众议院通过的《农村STEM教育研究法》的目的是，该项目将是独一无二的，以提高内布拉斯加州东北部向学生提供优质STEM教育和STEM劳动力发展计划的能力。特别是，在其6年的持续时间内，该项目将为4年的奖学金提供4年奖学金，以涉及来自农村社区的18个鲜明才华的低收入学生（分别有3个不同的6个学生），专业的生物学，化学或数学学业。除了经济支持外，还将为学生提供全面的课程和课外支持机会，旨在减少和消除STEM成功和学位完成的障碍。在最初的阶段，学生将能够在大一新生开始之前参加“在科学一周中取得成功”，以准备他们为STEM教育的严格教育做好准备，并开始在他们的队列科学小组中建立社区意识。额外的支持机会将包括社区自愿，教职员工，实习，在校园生活2年，参与和演讲，在科学会议上，特别职业咨询，补充指导以及教师心理，以帮助学生识别和进行研究项目。作为该项目的另一个组成部分，教职员工将能够参加一家教师移动暑期研究所，该研究所将提供基于证据的教学方法的培训。项目调查人员将传播与项目挑战和成功有关的结果和发现，尤其是对于其他努力支持低收入STEM学生的小型公共乡村机构。为了提高STEM学位的完成，以表现出的经济需求表现出低收入，高名的大学生，该项目将追求几个目标。首先是消除财务障碍，并适应，实施和分析一系列基于证据的策略，以建立支持，保留和毕业的能力，并毕业该项目的粗糙生物学，化学和数学学者。其次是通过为学生提供特殊的职业准备机会来增强区域STEM劳动力，以便他们通过就业或追求高级学位做出贡献。第三是通过实施，测试和研究通过项目评估策略来系统地支持STEM中的学生学术和职业途径来为知识库做出贡献。第四是传播与促进学生成功的支持和干预措施相关的结果和发现，以支持其他机构，以支持有才华的低收入STEM学生。旨在解决目标，项目评估旨在采用定性和定量方法来洞悉项目策略的有效性，以向项目提供形成性和总结性的反馈，并确定有效的复制，尤其是在其他粗糙环境中。与此相关的是，投资的方向将解决文献中的差距，并增强对农村，第一代，低收入，学术才华的学生所特有的有影响力和实用干预措施的知识基础。该项目由NSF在科学，技术，工程和数学计划方面的奖学金提供资金，该计划旨在增加具有证明经济需求的低收入学术才华的学生人数，他们在STEM领域获得了学位。它还旨在改善未来STEM工人的教育，并为低收入学生的学术成功，保留，转移，毕业以及学术/职业途径提供知识。这项奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是值得通过基金会的知识分子优点和更广泛的审查标准通过评估来通过评估来支持的。