MGE@MSAPhase II - Year One

STC Broadening Participation Workshop

Diversifying the Science and Engineering Workforce

March 21 – 23, 2007

Albert L. McHenry, Ph.D.

Director AGEP

Arizona State University

From Phase II RFP• AbstractThe Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP)

program is intended to significantly increase the number of domestic students receiving doctoral degrees in the sciences, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

Emphasis is on the population groups that are underrepresented in these fields:

(i.e., African Americans, Hispanics, American Indians, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians or other Pacific Islanders).

AGEP is particularly interested in increasing the number of persons from these groups who successfully enter the professoriate in these disciplines.

MGE@MSA Phase II List of Partners

• The institutions participating in our alliance for MGE@MSA (More Graduate Education at Mountain States Alliance) AGEP Phase II (2005-2010) are:

• Arizona State University (lead)

• University of New Mexico

• University of Arizona

• University of Utah

• Utah State University

• Brigham Young University

• University of Nevada, Reno

• University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

The National Picture

Attrition of Underrepresented Minorities in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Science (excluding Social Sciences) Between Receipt of Baccalaureate Degree and Receipt of the Master’s Degree and Between Receipt of Master’s Degree and Receipt of Doctoral Degree % of Total % of Total % of Total Undergraduate Masters Doctoral Ethnicity STEM Degrees STEM Degrees STEM Degrees African American 6.75% 3.14% 2.02% Hispanic American 6.20% 3.02% 3.43% Native American 0.60% 0.29% 0.22% Sources: Science & Engineering Indicators—2004, Appendix Tables 2-23, 2-25, & 2-27.

National TrendsPercentage of Underrepresented Minorities in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Science (excluding Social Sciences) Employed as Post-doctoral Researchers or Full-time Faculty % of Total % of Total Post-doctoral Full-time Ethnicity Researchers Faculty African American 2.86% 3.15% Hispanic American 3.43% 3.15% Native American 0.00% 0.37% Sources: Science & Engineering Indicators—2004, Appendix Table 5-24.

Challenges Identified

Making students fully aware of and fully prepared to meet the opportunities and challenges of academic careers.

Providing personal assistance with the recruitment and placement of underrepresented minority STEM Ph.D. graduates into appropriate post-doctoral appointments.

Ensuring that each underrepresented minority STEM Post-doctoral researcher has a well-trained and motivated career mentor who help him or her use their Post-doctoral experience to most effectively prepare for a successful faculty career.

Providing personal assistance with the recruitment and placement of underrepresented minority STEM Post-doctoral researchers into appropriate faculty appointments.

Ensuring that each underrepresented minority STEM junior faculty member has a well-trained and motivated career mentor who will help him or her to be expeditiously and highly proficiently productive as faculty researcher, as well as teacher and public servant, leading to the successful attainment of tenure.

The Solution

• Recruitment• Retention• Expeditious Graduation• Placement in Post-Doctoral Positions• Mentoring of Post-Doc Scholar• Transition to Faculty Position• Mentoring of Junior Faculty

Recruitment

• A consolidated graduate student application form which the participating graduate schools accept for the purpose of full admission or pre-admission. Students applying to several graduate schools save enormous amounts of time and effort through this service.

• Application fee waivers for students applying to most participating Graduate Schools.

• A centralized credentials service that permits students to apply to several graduate schools simultaneously without having to submit more than one application, one transcript for each undergraduate institution attended, and one set of recommendation letters.

• A concerted effort to obtain the necessary financial aid from the participating graduate schools or third parties such as government agencies (In our most recent year, over 85% of our students received financial aid, most commonly fellowships or assistantships with tuition scholarships).

• A toll-free 1-800 telephone line through which we provide intensive, in-depth support and consultation for the student with our professional advisors at every step of the admissions process and as often as the student requires.

• Faculty Doctoral Mentoring InstitutesProvide faculty mentors with the resources and the skills

in their specific disciplines to function as truly effective mentors of minority graduate students. Each institute is led by nationally recognized science and engineering faculty who have a track record of successfully mentoring and graduating minority doctoral students. These are now available on DVD-ROM.

Retention

Expeditious Graduation

• Faculty Documentation of Student ProgressProvides students with guidance on how they should be

progressing in order to meet the graduate degree requirements, not in a nominal sense, but genuinely calibrated to the research expectations of the sponsoring department. Students will report on their progress in all graduate components and faculty will review these reports before they submit them. Students will compile weekly reports that will provide the basis for faculty review and documentation and will submit copies to WAESO at the end of each semester

• Protegeé Peer NetworkFacilitates and encourages peer networking and peer advising

between and among beginning, intermediate, and advanced graduate students in order to help the students, especially beginning students, progress effectively and expeditiously towards degree completion.

Placement inPost-Doctoral Positions

• Travel Support

MGE@MSA provides travel support for our doctoral graduates to seek post doctoral research employment in universities and government agencies. We do not provide similar support for private corporate employment.

• Partial Salary and Benefits Support for Postdoctoral Research Experiences

MGE@MSA Co-Project Directors and staff work with individual MGE@MSA underrepresented minority doctoral graduates to help arrange for them appropriate postdoctoral research experiences of from one to three years that may be cost-shared between MGE@MSA and an appropriate university or government laboratory.

Mentoring of Postdoctoral Researchers

• Faculty Underrepresented Minority STEM Post-doctoral Researcher Mentoring Institutes

These institutes feature presidential mentors and other highly successful faculty mentors of postdoctoral researchers as well as current and former

MGE@MSA underrepresented minority post-doctoral researchers sharing important information to better prepare faculty members to successfully recruit and mentor underrepresented minority STEM postdoctoral researchers.

• Travel, Materials & Supplies, and Publication Support

MGE@MSA provides travel support for our postdoctoral researchers to present their research, network professionally, and for additional professional development opportunities. We also provide support for research materials and supplies not otherwise available and support for publication costs.

Transition to Tenure-Track Junior Faculty

Employment

• Travel Support

MGE@MSA provides travel support for our current postdoctoral researchers and former doctoral graduates to seek tenure-track junior faculty employment in universities and government agencies. We do not provide similar support for private corporate employment.

Mentoring of Junior Faculty

• Best Faculty Mentoring Programs

MGE@MSA staff collect available information on successful programs nationwide which provide mentoring and professional development information to tenure-track junior faculty members. We then work both to make such information available to our MGE@MSA underrepresented minority STEM tenure-track junior faculty members and also work with each to select appropriate workshop(s) both pre-service and in-service for which we will provide, as necessary, all travel and program fees for participation.

• Travel, Materials & Supplies, and Publication Support

MGE@MSA provides travel support for our junior faculty members to present their research, network professionally, and for additional professional development opportunities. We also provide support for research materials and supplies not otherwise available and support for publication costs.

WAESO/MGE@MSAUpcoming 2007 Activities

• Host Louisiana LSAMP/AGEP Annual Meeting at Arizona State University– Sunday, April 22, 2007

• Annual WAESO/MGE@MSA Student Research Conference– Monday, April 23, 2007

• First MGE@MSA Faculty Postdoctoral Mentoring Institute– Monday, April 23, 2007

• Technological Enhancement of Humans? Perspectives of Researchers from Underrepresented Populations Conference– Tuesday, April 24, 2007

• Faculty Doctoral Mentoring Institute at University of Nevada, Reno– TBA

• National Science Foundation Human Resource Development Joint Annual Meeting (Washington, DC)– August 12-14, 2007