State University of New York, Purchase College began its Baccalaureate and Beyond Science Mentoring Program in 2000. The program has mentored 201 underrepresented students to succeed academically and complete Bachelor's degrees in science technology, engineering and math fields (STEM). The program provides a full array of mentoring activities for community college students to assist them to complete their Associates degrees, transfer to a four-year college and complete Bachelor's degrees. These include academic monitoring, academic advising, tutoring, peer mentoring, career counseling, parent events, and an intensive research program during the summer. Students in the program are completing Bachelor?s degrees at three times the national average for community college students; 70% complete Bachelor?s degrees in STEM fields. Twenty-two percent of participating students who have completed Bachelor degrees have continued their STEM studies in graduate school. One student has already completed her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, while several others have completed Masters Degrees or are in graduate school studying Biochemistry, Neuropharmacology, Medicine and Optometry; several are working in the scientific workforce as research scientists. The Baccalaureate and Beyond Program is highly successful at assisting underrepresented minority, low-income and first-generation college students to succeed in STEM disciplines. Nationally, the rates of bachelor degree completion for African American and Hispanic students are substantially below those of non-Hispanic Caucasian students. The program mentors these students to succeed academically to complete Bachelor's degrees in STEM fields in order to prepare them for the STEM workforce. Of the 201 students served thus far, 70% have been underrepresented minorities. The program enhances the infrastructure for supporting these students at the six community colleges that partner with Purchase College. This is accomplished through biannual meetings of community college presidents to discuss program challenges and student success stories, pedagogy workshops for community college faculty to improve the teaching of introductory science courses, and collaborative academic monitoring of students.
