The Minority Biomedical Research Support (MBRS) Program at the University of Hawaii at Manoa has the goal to provide high quality research experiences in the biomedical sciences for undergraduate minority students. Students of the following ethnic identities are under- represented in Hawaii's health professions and at the university: Hawaiian or Part-Hawaiian, Filipino, Samoan and American Pacific Islander. These groups combined total 35% of the State population, but are severely under-represented at UHM totalling only 16% of the student body. Locally known as the Haumana (Hawaiian word for """"""""Student"""""""") Biomedical Program, the program's approach is multidisciplinary, involving some 22 faculty from 10 science fields. A total of 27 undergraduate participants and three graduate assistants will have tow year research experiences on the grant. Students actively recruited will have an opportunity to choose from a wide variety of scientific research projects. Through the research lab experience and career guidance the program seeks to motivate a greater number of ethnic minorities to pursue careers in research. A second key factor in this process is the opportunity the program provides for the student to attend, and/or present scientific results at a mainland conference and to produce work for publication. Two enrichment courses will be offered during the second year, a course on """"""""Issues and Skills for Success in a Biomedical Career"""""""" and a course on """"""""Science Communication Skills"""""""". We will continue our successful MBRS campus exchange visit with UH Hilo MBRS program participants. Our program has had previous success obtaining University funds for those MBRS students who exhausted their MBRS salary allotments prior to the end of the program year, and we will seek similar resources in the new grant cycle. An innovation of this grant cycle includes the submission of four potential principal investigators to our program which has been designed as an associate investigator program for several grant cycles. This innovation is congruent with our second program goal to assist faculty at minority institutions in developing biomedical research capabilities, thereby enhancing the institutions potential to conduct biomedical research activities and to attract new funding sources. Such active laboratories provide inter alia high quality research opportunities for minority students.
