California State University, Fullerton (CSUF) proposes to establish a Minority Biomedical Research Support program on its campus. The objective of the program is to provide opportunities and incentives for ethnic minority students to enter biomedical research careers. The approach is to provide the students with employment as researchers, addressing real research problems under the guidance of experienced faculty researchers. The proposal is for a three year program encompassing 5 separate research projects that would employ 10 minority students, both graduate and undergraduate, each year. A program director, an advisory committee, and related activities are proposed to coordinate and guide the research projects and to recruit and select ethnic minority students. The projected direct cost of the program is $109,583 in the first year and $334,803 for all three years. The Vice President for Academic Affairs and the Dean of Natural Science and Mathematics have both committed funds to support the MBRS program. Collectively and individually, the projects have been chosen to maximize the breadth and quality of opportunities for minority students. These faculty members are qualified and interested in working well with students as researchers. These faculty have supervised student research projects, served in faculty mentor programs for minorities, served as advisers to student groups, published with student coauthors, and administered research programs. The excellent scientific quality and biomedical importance of the projects will ensure that the students will have research experiences that do prepare them appropriately for graduate and professional work. Approximately 30% of CSUF students are from ethnic minority groups, and this percentage is expected to increase substantially in the future. Ethnic minorities are increasing as a proportion of the college-age population in the university's service area; they are already 40% of the k-12 students. CSUF has many active programs designed to attract, assist, retain, and graduate minority students. The proposal includes specific steps for integrating an MBRS program with those other activities, so that it may both augment them and be assisted by them. These steps include providing MBRS tutorial activities in cooperation with the Minority Engineering Program.
