9619060 Clute The project establishes a comprehensive web of links for women helping women to create supportive environments across universities and public schools to provide encouragement, guidance and educational opportunities to all females involved, focusing upon the areas of mathematics and the sciences. University faculty are linked with college majors and 7th and 8th grade female students, and college majors are linked with teacher consultants, 7th and 8th grade female students, and professional women in organizations such as AAUW. The ATHENA project is to provide tutoring, instruction, and mentoring services to annual cohorts of seventh and eighth grade female students. These services are provided by female college mathematics and science majors to supplement the mathematics and science curricula at the middle schools. The college majors are to use the Math and Science Professional Resource Center at University of California-Riverside to help the 7th and 8th grade female students complete homework, research papers, and other academic assignments and activities. The center also is to be used for parent involvement activities to expose them to the world of mathematics and science and potential careers for women. Through the project, the female college mathematics and science majors learn about the teaching profession, receive academic and financial support, obtain experience in providing classroom instruction, have access to a broad range of resources, and receive support and encouragement from faculty mentors and teacher consultants to pursue teaching as a career. Mentoring relationships are to be created by linking faculty from the University of California-Riverside, who do research and teaching in their respective fields, with the college majors. Their training includes specific courses on effective strategies for teaching and learning mathematics and science. The faculty mentors provide encouragement and support for the college majors to collaborate in preparing present ations and research papers for presentation at professional conferences.
