Creating Educational Pathways and Cultivating Leadership at a Hispanic-Serving Regional University to Prepare Undergraduates for STEM Careers in Water Science and Technology Fields

This project will contribute to the national need for skilled scientists, mathematicians, engineers, and technicians. To do so, it will support the retention and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students at Texas A&M University-San Antonio, a four-year regional, Hispanic serving institution. Over its five-year duration, the project will provide scholarships to 33 full-time students.

The Scholars will be selected as five annual cohorts and include first-year students and third-year transfer students. They will receive one to four years of scholarship support as they pursue bachelor’s degrees in Biology, Water Resources Science and Technology, Mathematics, or Electronic Engineering and Technology. The Scholars will work with faculty research mentors on regional water resource challenges.

Examples of research projects include analysis of water security in the increasingly urbanized areas of south-central Texas and design of low-impact restoration and development in sensitive watersheds. Because the University’s undergraduate student population is predominantly Hispanic, low-income, and first-generation, the project has the potential to diversify the STEM workforce, particularly in water-related fields.

The overall goal of this project is to increase STEM degree completion of low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need. The project’s specific aims include: 1) developing student-faculty mentorship and learning assessment tools that elevate Scholars’ academic and career success; and 2) designing and implementing curriculum/co-curriculum improvements to prepare students for impactful STEM careers in water-related fields.

Project investigators will test the hypothesis that basing learning activities on an issue of regional and social significance (water science and technology) will promote the Scholars’ scientific identity and bolster their academic achievement. The project team will also investigate the differential effects of scholarship selection criteria, length of scholarship, the status of cohorts, and the types of mentorship practices on Scholars’ academic achievement.

The project will be evaluated using performance metrics from both faculty mentors (types of practices and their duration and frequency) and Scholars (academic performance, retention to graduation, graduate school matriculation). Project results will be made available through campus-wide seminars, workshops for schoolteachers, STEM education and professional conferences, and peer-reviewed publications.

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.