Recognizing and Developing STEM Talent Among Diverse Populations

STEM talent is often overlooked in underrepresented students resulting in limited opportunities to increase STEM interest and talent inside or outside of school settings. Academically qualified underrepresented students are less likely to be recommended for advanced placement STEM courses causing a racial divide and contributing to a lack of belonging in these courses. Methods to encourage STEM talent development and persistence in students from underrepresented populations include frontloading talent development interventions, creating afterschool or informal STEM programs, providing enrichment opportunities for highly capable students, and creating equitable access to advanced courses. This chapter presents the characteristics of STEM talent in underrepresented populations and strategies to identify high potential students, provides frontloading examples to develop STEM talent, offers examples of effective programming, and suggests instructional strategies to encourage STEM talent development in diverse populations.

Historically Underrepresented Students Redefining College Success in Higher Education

Extant definitions of college success largely focus on macro-level academic outcomes including academic achievement, retention, and persistence, which are linked to a limited set of indicators achievable by students including high grade averages, extra-curricular involvement, and leadership that denote a successful college student. These normative ideas of college success sustain ideologies that dismiss the multiplicity of ways students experience success in college and most importantly, they define who can and cannot be characterized as a successful college student. Relatedly, the dominant narrative of college success frames historically underrepresented college students (e.g. first-generation, low-income, students of color) as deficient and as less likely to be successful, even though these students consistently have to overcome greater adversity during their college trajectories and consequently experience many victories that are not legitimized as a success. Therefore, the purpose of this manuscript is to propose a more inclusive definition of the term college success that accounts for the diverse realities of students historically underrepresented and reveals the direct connection between student success and institutional success. Authors draw evidence from two research studies to illustrate their proposed definition of college success and provide implications for research, practice, and policy.

Unspoken barriers: Promoting equity in postsecondary service learning opportunities

While there is an abundance of relevant data on the outcomes of service learning experiences, less is known about how students find service learning experiences. Additionally, little research focuses on capturing the experiences of students’ participation in service learning, especially among underrepresented students. New lines of inquiry could include qualitative studies that seek to better understand the service learning experiences of underrepresented students (i.e., students of color and low socioeconomic status) to explore potential barriers to full participation. In this essay, the author proposes new lines of inquiry when studying issues of access in service learning opportunities, drawing on her experience as a coordinator for a university’s mentoring program. The author argues that studying the experiences of undergraduates engaged in service learning opportunities might highlight barriers to equitable access to and full participation in service learning opportunities and thereby postsecondary outcomes.

Extending the Reach of the STARs (Students Tackling Advanced Research)

Background Participating in research opportunities during undergraduate education is met with myriad benefits. Students learn the scientific research process, how to think critically, develop transferable skills, refine public speaking, build a professional network, and gain confidence. Despite the numerous benefits of undergraduate research participation, underrepresented and minority (URM) students (e.g., first-generation, low-income, and historically underrepresented students) often do not engage in these valuable undergraduate research opportunities. Objective To begin breaking down some of these historical barriers to participation, we developed the Students Tackling Advanced Research (STAR) Scholars Program. Method A holistic educational outreach program was designed to facilitate underrepresented undergraduate students’ involvement in research and help them understand why research is important in a greater context. Conclusion Students who participated in STAR Scholars self-report positive impacts on understanding what research is, ways to seek out research opportunities, and what steps to take toward future educational and professional goals. Teaching Implications It is imperative to explicitly target barriers that underrepresented students face to allow for equity and inclusion in research and academia. Workshops and activities designed to demystify research, build networking and professional skills, and provide mentorship to students are successful in breaking down these barriers and increase student confidence and competence.

Developing Self-Efficacy and Behavioral Intentions Among Underrepresented Students in STEM: The Role of Active Learning

Increasing academic participation among students from ethnic-racial underrepresented groups in STEM yields societal benefits including ameliorating economic ramifications of the labor shortages in STEM, improving scientific innovation, and providing opportunity, access, and participation in high-status STEM fields. Two longitudinal studies with students from underrepresented groups investigated the role of active learning interventions in the development of STEM self-efficacy and intentions to pursue STEM in the future. Study 1 longitudinally tracked high school students participating in a 4-week geoscience program that applied active learning techniques ranging from hands on experiments to peer discussion. High school student participants displayed increases in self-efficacy and STEM intentions from the start to completion of the program, an effect that was observed exclusively among those who reported strong program quality. Study 2 examined the role of mentorship effectiveness with a sample of community college STEM students interested in transferring to a 4-year college. Students’ relatively strong self-efficacy and STEM intentions at the start of the semester remained stable through the end of the semester. Altogether, the present research highlights the role of positive, inclusive educational climates in promoting STEM success among students from underrepresented group members.

Writing Skills Development for Graduate Studies and Career Readiness in Science and Aging Fields: A Case Study Approach

Increasing the number of racially and ethnically underrepresented students who pursue scientific graduate studies in programs focusing on science and aging offers an opportunity to increase the number of aging specialists while simultaneously promoting diversity in the research labor market and supporting new ideas. This case study aims to better understand how students participating in an academic preparatory program experience a writing class contextualized within (1) students' writing background and (2) students' future ambitions related to science and aging. The individually-tailored writing class was taught as a critical component of a comprehensive educational program that targets underrepresented racial and ethnic minority undergraduate students who are interested in pursuing scientific graduate studies in fields related to aging. The researchers conducted semi-structured qualitative interviews with students (n = 4) enrolled in the 24-month fellowship training program, which included participation in the writing course during the summer prior to their senior year of undergraduate education. All participants were young adult college students who identified as Black or African American and female. Using thematic coding, statements about professional writing skills were divided into four primary themes: (1) prior experiences, (2) class experiences, (3) future goals and ambitions, and (4) structural considerations. These themes suggest potential implications for effective interventions aimed to advance the writing skills and academic and career readiness of racially and ethnically diverse students entering fields of science and aging.

A Pipeline to Increase Public Health Diversity: Describing the Academic Enrichment Components of the Summer Public Health Scholars Program

A public health workforce that reflects the increasing diversity of the U.S. population is critical for health promotion and to eliminate persistent health disparities. Academic institutions must provide appropriate education and training to increase diversity in public health professions to improve efforts to provide culturally competent care and programs in the most vulnerable communities. Reaching into the existing talent pool of diverse candidates at the undergraduate level is a promising avenue for building a pipeline to advanced training and professional careers in the field of public health. The Summer Public Health Scholars Program (SPHSP) at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center (CUIMC) is a 10-week summer internship program with a mission to increase knowledge and interest in public health and biomedical sciences. Funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Undergraduate Public Health Summer Programs, sponsored by the CDC’s Office of Minority Health and Health Equity, SPHSP aims to pipeline underrepresented students into public health graduate programs and careers by providing mentorship, academic enrichment, professional development, and field-based placements. The SPHSP is uniquely positioned to offer scholars a program that exposes them to core public health training components through the joint effort of all four CUIMC schools: public health, dentistry, nursing, and medicine. Here, we describe the program’s academic enrichment components, which provide advanced and multifaceted public health training opportunities. We discuss the impacts of the program on student outcomes and lessons learned in developing and refining the program model.