2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Board 397: The Development of Professional Mentors to Supplement Low Socio-Economic Students’ Webs-of-Support

Presented at NSF Grantees Poster Session

The National Science Foundation approved a program in 2016 to investigate the influence of adult mentors on low socio-economic students seeking collegiate degrees in STEM fields. Students who expressed a strong desire for an engineering major at a state-supported land grant institution and were denied admission into engineering, but then admitted into Exploratory Studies, were given scholarships and focused mentoring by faculty and staff. The Rising Scholars program had very specific pathway activities through a collegiate career, designed to introduce the student to a variety of potential adult mentors. Students were enrolled in several experiential activities, placing them in proximity with multiple faculty, graduate students, and staff members. Support network members were tracked by researchers throughout the study, and a special index was developed which identifies professional contact. Results indicated that students applying the mentor recruitment methodology actively enhanced their support networks and finished college with a strong web of professional support.

Authors

Sarah LaRose http://orcid.org/https://0000-0002-0279-783X [biography]

Dr. LaRose is an agricultural teacher educator in the Purdue ASEC Department in West Lafayette, Indiana, where she holds a joint appointment between the College of Agriculture and College of Education. As a member of a military family, LaRose grew up moving to various domestic and international locations before her family settled in Connecticut, where she first enrolled in agricultural education CTE courses at her high school. She began her career in agricultural education with degrees in animal science (BS) and curriculum and instruction (MA) from the University of Connecticut, and then served as an agricultural education instructor at Nonnewaug High School in Woodbury, Connecticut for seven years. Dr. LaRose has a long history of involvement with the National FFA Organization, and her teaching is driven by her passion for the transformative benefits that students gain from participating in any of the myriad of opportunities available through agricultural education. After her time in the classroom, Dr. LaRose completed her PhD in Agricultural Education and Communication from the University of Florida. Since her arrival to Purdue, LaRose has contributed to revising the undergraduate Agricultural Education major, adding new coursework, and bringing programming up to date to the needs of today’s teachers. She teaches undergraduate coursework in Teaching Methods, Curriculum Development, and Laboratory Practices in Agricultural Education. Additionally, she supervises student teachers as a university supervisor, helps to advise the Purdue student chapter of the Indiana Association of Agricultural Educators, and contributes to Indiana agriculture teacher professional development opportunities, including conducting workshops and offering graduate level coursework for teachers entering the profession from the agriculture industry. She was recently selected as the 2022 ACTE National Postsecondary Professional of the Year, and as the Outstanding Early Career Teacher at Purdue’s College of Agriculture.
Dr. Robert Merton Stwalley III P.E. Purdue University, West Lafayette [biography]

Dr. Robert M. Stwalley III, P.E. joined the Agricultural & Biological Engineering department as a faculty member in the fall of 2013. He earned his Bachelor of Science in Agriculture and Biological Engineering (ABE) and his M.S.E. and Ph.D. from ME.

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