This NSF INCLUDES planning grant is funded by NSF Inclusion across the Nation of Communities of Learners of Underrepresented Discoverers in Engineering and Science (NSF INCLUDES), a comprehensive national initiative to enhance U.S. leadership in discoveries and innovations by focusing on diversity, inclusion and broadening participation in STEM at scale. The goal of this planning grant is to develop a diverse, community-led, and national network for collective impact, supported by the latest academic thought leadership to prepare young people with valuable STEM education and workforce opportunities in energy by combining the resources of 3 universities and 3 cities to serve 1 singular vision: the 331 STEM:Energy Initiative. Many states and communities seek to increase the diversity of their local clean energy workforce as they pursue goals for decarbonization and clean-energy deployment. Yet, the supporting education systems and human capital "pipelines" are not sufficiently developed to support a diverse clean-energy workforce proportional to the scale of the envisioned energy transition. The initiative will initially focus on three major metro areas with diverse populations that are underrepresented in the growing clean energy workforce: Houston, Detroit, and Minneapolis.
This planning project will build an ecosystem of support for STEM education and workforce development in each of the three sites by connecting local universities, community leaders, schools, and clean energy companies to develop and deliver training and education in a distributed cohort of students who learn in parallel across the three sites. This work is unique in that each local cohort will be paired with a locally-sited community solar project. Community solar represents a growing trend across the US that has the potential to create significant local economic and environmental benefits. Each cohort will be directly working hands-on with a solar project that creates local benefits for the community in which the students live. Participants will develop a greater understanding of how they may become leaders in science, technology, engineering, and math; how their personal choices affect energy use and the environment; and potentially find opportunities for employment in the clean energy workforce.
This work will advance knowledge in several key areas that may broaden participation in STEM and ultimately the clean energy workforce. The nature of the model presents an opportunity to incorporate community-based participatory research as well as STEM education and local workforce development opportunities, intended to help improve the diversity of the clean energy workforce. The initiative will develop a unique, scalable method to evaluate curricular needs and pathways and create a workforce pipeline. Additionally, we will determine appropriate community engagement strategies based on roles, community needs, and project requirements to determine successful program elements between and within unique community contexts.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
