This award supports several aspects of the second phase of the EDGE Program, "Enhancing Diversity in Graduate Education." Core funding for the first phase of the program was provided by the National Science Foundation from 1998 to 2001, with additional support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the National Security Agency. The goal of the program is to increase the number of women and minority students who successfully complete graduate programs in the mathematical sciences, by strengthening the ability of the targeted student population to successfully negotiate the transition from undergraduate to graduate education in mathematics, and to succeed in their respective graduate programs.
The EDGE Program has two basic components: an intensive summer program prior to graduate school enrollment, and a follow-up mentoring program. In the first phase of the program, the summer component alternated between Bryn Mawr and Spelman Colleges. The second phase of the EDGE Program will consist of three major components:
[1] a centrally administered program with a core staff consisting of the Co-Directors Rhonda Hughes of Bryn Mawr College and Sylvia Bozeman of Spelman College, as well as an Administrative Assistant. The core staff would maintain data on all EDGE participants, manage advertising and selection of participants, select host sites for the summer program, and coordinate the follow-up mentoring program; [2] a portable design for the EDGE Summer Program. By involving a core group of select institutions as EDGE sites, the program will be made more visible, it will reach a wider audience of students, and the number of undergraduate and graduate programs aware of the goals of the program would necessarily expand. [3] a biennial EDGE Symposium. This event would include an EDGE Reunion of past participants, as well as a forum to promote the advancement of women, and in particular minority women, involving a broader segment of the mathematics community. The first symposium will be hosted by Spelman College in 2003.
This award will specifically support several aspects of the proposed activities: travel funds for prospective Local Coordinators, who will participate in the expansion of the program to other sites; support of the EDGE Symposium, as well as smaller reunions for past participants who have strongly expressed the need to return to the program in the year following their participation; participant support costs for two "returning" women who have interrupted their academic careers for a variety of reasons and wish to attend a graduate program in mathematics; and consultant support for an improved and expanded web site.
