With an NSF S-STEM award, Rio Hondo College is annually supporting approximately 21 academically talented and financially needy STEM students through the "Scholarships to Aid Rio Hondo STEM Students"(STARRS) program. By reducing financial barriers, the college is augmenting retention and increasing persistence through several proven techniques.
STARRS scholars are attending full-time, working less hours at jobs, meeting regularly with faculty mentors, and participating in the college's Math, Engineering, and Science Achievement (MESA) and/or TRiO Student Support Services STEM (SSS) programs. These students have access to the MESA Center and careful advising to support their personal educational plans. In addition they have priority registration to implement a clustering into the same sections of mathematics and science courses, regular contact with the MESA/SSS STEM Director and the Educational Advisor, financial literacy education, and support for additional scholarship and internship applications.
STARRS students are encouraged to attend Academic Excellence Workshops led by student-peer facilitators to help them excel in mathematics, physics and chemistry courses, and they can utilize drop-in tutoring in mathematics, physics, chemistry and biology in the MESA Center. One-on-one tutoring is freely available for students who are identified by an early alert system. S-STEM scholars may attend transfer conferences, tours of four-year colleges, universities, and local industry employers, and they are eligible to apply for all-expenses-paid travel to meetings of professional societies.
This program has the innovative feature that scholarship amounts are determined by the number of science and mathematics courses in which the student enrolls during the next academic year. Applicants must show residency, be a STEM major, show financial need, demonstrate academic merit, and submit an essay describing academic goals and how the scholarship will enable them to reduce the number of work hours. Results from these innovative scholarship features are being disseminated through conferences and the college's website.
