Summer Bridge/Undergraduate Research Program – Going Remote with COVID-19
General description of the project
The goal of a Department of Education MSEIP grant award (P120A190069) entitled Enhancing STEM Success targets a program that encourages, prepares, and supports minority STEM students, particularly minority females, to successful completion of the baccalaureate degree. The targeted population focuses on undergraduate years, where transitions and rigor often create barriers targeted by the project. The project addresses these barriers and transitions primarily through mentoring and research skill development. Project Co-PIs (Subject Matter Experts) offered their expertise, laboratories, and creativity for summer mentored research. These rich experiences connect course work to scientific research, thus supporting academic achievement, career investigations, and degree completion. Students were required to generate 8-10 hours of mentored research weekly. In June 2020, the UHD summer research program recruited entering freshmen, transitioning sophomores and juniors lacking experience in research. Due to COVID-19, all mentored experiences were virtual, using Zoom video-conferencing. Thirty-eight participants were accepted into the program.
Technologies
Primary technology utilized was Zoom video-conferencing software for synchronous orientations, Co-PI meetings with undergraduate researchers. Secondarily, MS Teams was used as a portal for all reports, submissions by undergraduates, and Q&A associated with the mentored research experiences. Video-taped oral presentations were mandatory for all research groups. Research groups used Zoom for this metric as well. Zoom enabled communication avenues where all participants, including PhDs, were when weekly research meetings were scheduled by each PhD and/or the group members. Additionally, GroupMe texting mobile application was used by all undergraduate groups as another informal method of communication. Because the mentored research was taking place in virtual settings, using the Zoom and other software applications, the PhD set goals based on the overall goals of the mentoring program and each were able to achieve performance goals. Demographic and ethnic data will be shared illustrating the success metrics associated with the use of the technologies.
Explain project results
The project results definitely supported not only online learning and technology integration, but also student retention. Because the virtual mentored research involved a summer bridge program, retention data was collected and will be shared. UHD is an HSI and an MSI federally designated institution the majority of undergraduate participants in this project were Hispanic, females, and African American undergraduates. Both ethnicity and major were tracked as well as retention and attendance. Thus, these results are used to support the success metrics of the project.
Why it should be considered best practice?
High impact practices, mentored research is one, clearly are supported by research as best practices (Lopatto, 2007; Kuh, 2008; and other researchers support this as a best practice).
Major sections of the US and its territories remain in virtual, semi-virtual, and/or hybrid modalities, so this session explains how virtual mentored research can be replicated and should be considered best practices.
Highlights of your proposed presentation
1. PI of the project will explain infrastructure used; 2. Co-PIs will explain how they went about the process of virtual mentored research; 3. Examples of student deliverables will be shared; 4. Lessons learned will be outlined by the PI and two Co-PIs as they revised how they would use virtual research as part of another grant project explaining the lessons learned.
The Evaluation Committee will evaluate submitted proposals based on the following criteria. Each area will be rated on a scale from 1 to 7 (1= non-satisfactory; 7 =outstanding), for a maximum of 63 points.