The College of Natural Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin seeks support for the planning and implementation of a new model of university/community college cooperation aimed at increasing the participation of African Americans, Native Americans, and Hispanics in the critical area of biomedical research. The proposed project, Building Articulation Through Undergraduate Research, will: 1) engage community college and university faculty members in the early identification (approximately one year before transfer) of community college minority students who show potential for advanced work in the biological sciences; 2) provide these students with a rich, immersive summer seminar/lab course developed and taught jointly by community college and university faculty on the University of Texas at Austin campus; 3) involve the summer seminar students in an academic year follow-up readings course on a topic related to biological research and co-supervised by a community college faculty member and a University of Texas at Austin faculty member; 4) upon the students' enrollment at LJT Austin, provide academic and social support that is connected directly to their biology course work; 5) lay the groundwork for on-going dialogues between biological science faculty and advisors at the community colleges and those at LJT that are structured around and sustained by student success.
