The Spelman STEM Scholars (S3) program is providing competitive scholarships and academic/career-building support to academically-talented, economically disadvantaged African American females who pursue a STEM degree. Special emphasis is being placed on building a critical mass of prospective engineering graduates in Spelman's dual-degree engineering program with Georgia Institute of Technology and its Black Graduate Student Association. Spelman's esteemed group of faculty, "The Vanguard Faculty," will support and guide the first-year students. In addition to the scholarship support, Spelman is developing three new support initiatives: 1) introduction to engineering seminar series, 2) a graduate student mentoring program, and 3) scholarship/graduate school writing workshop.
Previous annual reports indicate the rationale for how scholarships, through this grant are disseminated. Hence, in the report we will focus on the specifics of activities that were carried out during the grant award period. In all cases, scholarship awards were given to underrepresented minority women who had a major in a STEM discipline and who maintained a cummulative GPA of 3.0 or higher. Scholarship Awards S3 Original STEM Cohort (S3 Scholars): We began this grant in August 2009 with a cohort of 24 students. In May 2012, 12 (50%) of the students still remained in STEM and were on track to either complete their STEM degree at Spelman or to enroll at an engineering school to complete our dual-degree engineering program (DDEP). As of May 2013, 10 of these students have graduated. Two DDEP students in our have enrolled at Georgia Tech in engineering in August 2012 and are scheduled to complete their degrees from both Spelman and Georgia Tech by May 2014. We did not provide scholarships to the DDEP students because they are "technically" no longer enrolled at Spelman, but are transfer students at Georgia Tech. Of the ten students who have graduated, seven have gone to graduate school in a STEM area, one is enrolled in medical school, and the remaining two are employed in a STEM field. Financial Harships: This year we provided 37 scholarships to STEM majors who have demonstrated financial need, who are not part of the original cohort. In recent years we have seen an increase in the numbers of students who are unable to meet their financial obligations and have been forced to leave for a semster or to leave permanently. It is becoming increasingly difficult for students to secure loans to pay for their expenses. Additionally, we have some students who have amassed large loans that will keep them financial strapped after they graduate. The monies awarded to these students, through this NSF S-STEM grant, helped some of them stay at the College to complete their STEM degree and helped others relieve some of their loan obligations. Advising and Mentoring: Although students are primarily advised by faculty in their major departments, the scholarship recipients are required to meet with the PI to discuss academic progress and future plans at least once per semester. The students in the original S3 cohort are mentored by graduate students from Georgia Tech's Black Graduate Student Association (BGSA). The success of this mentoring program has been mixed. For the two S3 Scholars who transferred to Georgia Tech as part of the DDEP, the mentoring proved extremely beneficial as the students were introduced, early, to the Georgia Tech campus and had established relationships with students at Georgia Tech. On the other hand, as the years have progressed, some of our students have lost contact with their mentors. One student, who was paired with a male, expressed a preference for a female mentor. Unfortunately, the numbers of Black female graduate students in STEM at Georgia Tech is limited. We therefore found additional mentors through alumnae channels. Also, because the mentors were graduate students, it was difficult to find meeting times that would work for both our students and the Georgia Tech students. Community Service and outreach: For the last five years we have maintained a mentoring program with Salem Middle School in Lithonia, Georgia. Salem is 99% African American. This year our students mentored thirty girls from Salem. The Salem students visited Spelman's campus on three occasions. The activities included a social in February in which each Salem student was paired with at Spelman mentor, a shadow day during which the middle school students shadow their Spelman mentors to STEM classes and other on-campus activities, and participation in the College's annual Research Day acitivities where the Salem students are exposed to undergraduate research projects and are guided in their own STEM-related project module. The relationship with Salem has been a long-lasting one and we anticipate that this relationship will only continue to grow with time. Since this grant was obtained, Spelman has created a full-time position for a person whose sole responsibility is to foster STEM outreach and develop activities for younger students who visit our campus. Engineering Seminar Series and Other Professional Development Activities: This year the students were required to attend several professional development activities that included: (1) a workshop on writing personal statements for graduate school (Feb. 2013) held by the writing center, (2) a panel on navigating the STEM major (April 2013, the panelists were our original S3 cohort, most of whom were accepted to graduate programs in STEM), and (3) a workshop on applying for graduate fellowships and scholarships, specifically the Graduate Researcher's Fellowship Program (GRFP) to which at least one student did apply (November 2013).
