This competing continuation application for a Bridges to the Baccalaureate Degree Program grant will build upon exceptionally strong institutional and programmatic relationships between Essex County College and the Newark Campus of Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, and will develop new relationships with two other county colleges with significant enrollments of minority students traditionally underrepresented in the sciences Union County College and Passaic County College--to establish a higher education Bridges network in northern New Jersey. This network will work to increase significantly the number of underrepresented minority students who choose to enter, and who succeed in pursuing, careers in biomedical research. The northern New Jersey Bridges network has the potential to reach over 12,600 African-Americans, Latino- Americans, and Native American students enrolled at the three county colleges, which are located within 30 minutes of one another and Rutgers- Newark. Specific features of this expanded Bridges program will include: (a) hands-on summer laboratory research experiences, in laboratories of Rutgers faculty members, three mini-courses, with hands-on components, given each year for selected students and faculty from the three participating county colleges; invitations to county college students (and faculty) to attend regularly scheduled seminars at Rutgers specifically designed for potential science majors; (d) special lectures by Rutgers research faculty and researchers from other universities, medical schools, and industry at the county colleges; (f) a peer mentoring/counseling system in which county college students now at Rutgers-Newark ease the transition for new transfer students from county colleges to Rutgers; (g) collaboration between county college and Rutgers faculty members in curriculum development and integration; and (h) a rigorous evaluation and tracking system, designed and set up in collaboration with Rutgers University's Teaching Excellence Center, to assess program effectiveness. This multi-faceted approach is designed to increase awareness of minority students--both science majors and undeclared majors--at the participating county colleges of the varied career opportunities in the biomedical sciences.
