California State University, Monterey Bay (CSUMB) is a Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) created with the vision of bringing educational opportunities to underrepresented, low income, and first generation students in the tri-county (Monterey, San Benito and Santa Cruz) area. The primary goal of this project is to increase the number of students from these counties entering computer science by providing scholarships to financially disadvantaged students with high academic potential who otherwise might not be able to complete a college education. A set of support services are provided to increase retention and maintain a high graduation rate among the scholarship recipients, including cohort-building among scholarship recipients, summer enrichment workshops aimed at reinforcing academic skills, and individual faculty mentoring. Intellectual Merit: Research has shown that cooperative learning increases student success in computer science programs. This project focuses on building and supporting an engaged cohort of scholarship recipients by bringing them together in a summer enrichment workshop before each academic year, organizing study groups, seminars and social events, and providing faculty mentoring. Comfort with the material and perception of success have both been shown to influence retention in computer science students, particularly among female students. In order to build comfort level with Computer Science material, summer enrichment workshops are organized for the scholarship recipients to review the previous year's materials and to prepare for the following academic year. Broader Impact: It is projected that computer science will be one of the fastest growing occupations in coming years, yet bachelor degree production from CS programs has declined. In particular, women and minorities often do not participate in this job market. Despite the proximity of the tri-county area to Silicon Valley, the lack of success experienced by students from these communities is likely to continue without the opportunity to receive a rigorous college education in areas like computer science. This project directly addresses this need by recruiting and retaining students from surrounding counties into the Computer Science and Information Technology degree program at CSUMB. The unique, customizable degree program coupled with the financial support, summer enrichment workshops, and faculty mentoring are strong features of this projects.
