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 produce a strategic plan for building a collaborative infrastructure to address participation challenges for Native American, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, and Native Pacific Islander (NAAN-NHPI) students. Recent studies estimate that the percentage of students that complete a degree in a STEM major remains low. For STEM students from minoritized groups, the identification of relationships between STEM curriculum and students’ personal and cultural values, communal benefits, altruistic goals (e.g. social and environmental justice issues), and diverse cultural perspectives, cultivate the motivation and scientific identity linked to STEM persistence. Importantly, connecting Indigenous knowledges with western knowledge systems as the basis for transforming curricular and co-curricular programs and supports can improve STEM success, particularly for NAAN-NHPI students. The project provides the planning groundwork for a nodal network through local/institutional, local/multi-institutional, and regional nodes. This large-scale planning network is needed to ensure systemic, durable engagement of the NAAN-NHPI community and, thereby, develop a more diverse workforce to ensure our competitive and prosperous national future.
This planning project focuses primarily on the element of shared vision and includes specific outcomes related to the four other elements of the collaborative infrastructure. The main product of this planning process is a strategic plan for developing the network with a common agenda that articulates a collective understanding of the participation challenge within a place-based framework. The strategic plan includes the identification and listing of primary network partners as well as a description of how SENCER (Science Education for New Civic Engagements and Responsibilities) and the National Center for Science and Civic Engagement provide the “backbone†or support organization to help coordinate and facilitate the network. The team's strategic planning approach employs four dialogic elements 1) talking circles, 2) listening circles, 3) convenings, and 4) gatherings with “4†(a sacred number of four directions, seasons, daily stages, life stages) as a basis. All planning is virtual with culturally-grounded communication strategies. The project is anchored with four institutions (Humboldt State University, University of Utah, Texas Woman’s University, and University of Arkansas) and experienced guiding communities (University of Hawai‘i, the Confederated Salish Kootenai Tribes, and Alaskan Native communities) with contributions from both two- and four-year institutions. Over 50 institutions, including the California State University system, will be engaged in Alaska, Arkansas, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, and Utah. INCLUDES Network Alliances and projects representatives will be invited to participate in the convenings and gatherings. This project expands the scope of the current INCLUDES portfolio by focused support for NAAN-NHPI students.
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.
