Increasing Undergraduate Success in Science through Learning Cohorts Focused on Career Readiness

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 of South Carolina Upstate, a regional comprehensive university. Over its 5-year duration, this project will fund scholarships to 14 unique students who are pursuing bachelor’s degrees in biology and chemistry.

First-year students will receive 4-year scholarships. The project is centered on the theme of career readiness, emphasizing the National Association of Colleges and Employers’ career management competencies. Students will enter a learning cohort of fellow biology and chemistry majors; be co-enrolled in the same sections of introductory courses; and participate in a five-day pre-college summer orientation, a course on how to build social, cultural, and psychological capital relevant to STEM careers, and a career readiness workshop series.

Students will also receive multi-level mentoring by faculty and industry mentors, as well as facilitation of research and internship experiences. The project will customize and integrate the existing array of evidence-based high impact practices at the university into the activities for the scholar cohorts. The broader significance of the project will be felt across Upstate South Carolina, where biologists and chemists are needed by the many life sciences, advanced materials, and chemical companies in the region.

The project will positively affect the students’ lives by increasing their social mobility and confidence in STEM careers. Successful elements of the project will be incorporated into the general curriculum after project completion to maintain gains in student career preparedness, retention, and workforce placement for STEM students. The project will advance knowledge of the impact of a STEM learning cohort focused on career preparedness in four key areas: STEM motivation, academic experience, graduation rate, and workforce preparation.

The overall goal of this project is to recruit, retain, and graduate academically talented and low-income students who are interested in biology and chemistry. The project will introduce the undergraduate scholars to STEM career options, facilitate development of career management skills, and address attrition of biology and chemistry major from the university.

The scope of the project’s aims are to recruit seven scholars during each of the first two years of the project, increase the retention and graduation rates of biology and chemistry majors, and ensure that scholars have the necessary career skills to make valuable contributions to the STEM workforce. A research question will examine to what extent do career-relevant, high-impact activities contribute to student retention, gains in STEM motivation, social, cultural, and psychological capital development, and workforce preparedness for low-income, academically talented students.

New knowledge will be generated that describes the role of program components and a concerted focus on career readiness on success in STEM retention, degree completion, and career readiness. Evaluation will be based on mixed methods, including tallies of touchpoints with programming and interactions with mentors; participant surveys measuring engagement, program satisfaction and career readiness; and qualitative data, including responses to open ended survey questions and interviews.

Project results will be disseminated at interdisciplinary meetings at the university, across the University of South Carolina system, and through other regional and national conferences. Dissemination will highlight the program’s strategies, effectiveness of program elements, progress achieved with modified and new interventions, and how evaluation and research findings could be applied to other STEM majors.

Findings will be disseminated through articles in peer-reviewed journals and in scholarly educational media. This project is funded by NSF’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, which seeks to increase the number of academically talented low-income 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, 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.