This award is to support a meeting of directors of the Division of Astronomical Sciences (AST) Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Sites. The meeting will be held on May 19-20, 2014 in Flagstaff, Arizona, and will be hosted by the PI on the campus of Northern Arizona University, one of the AST REU sites. The intellectual merit of the meeting rests with the bringing together of site directors, current and new, to discuss successes and shortcomings in their own REU programs, and to establish best practices for future REU activities.
A major goal of the program is to foster ideas to achieve better success in recruiting minority students. Several people with specific expertise in minority-student recruitment will be invited to the meeting. Other topics include program evaluation, ethics, site management, and inter-program co-operation. The discussion of these issues will help broaden the impact of the AST REU portfolio, by improving the overall quality of the program, and making it more attractive to a broader range of students.
