This award is supporting the travel and conference related expenses for 12 faculty-undergraduate student teams from community colleges, who will present papers in a technical session titled, "Geoscience Programs at Community Colleges: Models for Success and Innovation" (session T104), during the 2009 Geological Society of America (GSA) national conference in Portland, Oregon. In addition, these attendees will be participating in a special focus group to discuss some of the issues and needs faced by geoscience faculty and students working within a 2-year college or community college setting. Discussions in the technical session and focus group will help advance NSF/GEO's understanding of how to better serve geoscientists working in the community college environment, where they are commonly isolated and lacking research infrastructure. The conference will provide valuable professional development for the participating faculty and help them forge new partnerships with 4-year colleges, larger research institutions, and employers within the private sector. It will expose the participating undergraduate students, who will be largely recruited from underrepresented minorities in STEM fields, to a sampling of education, mentoring, networking opportunities and the broad array of career pathways in the geosciences.
