2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

An NSF S-STEM scholarship program is drawing to a close at a private STEM university, providing an assets-based framework of wrap-around support for a small group of high-achieving, low-income students from the racially and ethnically diverse [1], high-poverty [2], local urban area. The program supports a portion of the cost of on-campus housing for 2 cohorts of 10 students, and is paired with a commitment from the university to support the unmet financial need with scholarships. All students in this program are first-generation college students and a high percentage are from under-represented groups in STEM. This program is funded by the NSF DUE Division of Undergraduate Education, EDU Directorate for STEM Education.

One goal is to improve matriculation, retention, and graduation rates of similar students. Admissions data from 2020–2024 shows no increase in application numbers or matriculation rates of students from the local urban high schools; the data is essentially flat over 5 years, which may reflect changes in admissions priorities. However, from the first cohort, 8-out-of-10 graduated within 4 academic years by May 2024, and the remaining 2 finished degree requirements by August 2024. This 100% retention and graduation rate within the program surpasses the university’s average rate of 83% over this same period.

A second goal to provide mentoring, advising, and guidance for the cohorts within the existing university system is performed by the support team: one faculty, two administrators, a near-peer mentor graduate student, and on-call support from academic advising and other offices. The small team has been with the cohorts during their entire time in college and have a holistic view of their experiences, which has led to high engagement of the scholars. A sense of belonging, safety, support, and care has been created.

Graduation success is attributed to students’ abilities and the team, who meet bi-weekly to report one-on-one student interactions, discuss paths forward, and plan just-in-time development programming. The unique insight of seeing how scholars navigate the university has afforded the team to suggest shifts to support many other students. The experiences from this S-STEM grant have contributed to re-written job duties at the Associate Dean-level to support non-traditional students through structured scholarship initiatives, in-house research fellowships, free summer courses, and pre-enrollment bridge programs. The team advocates for foundational change to create a more supporting and inclusive institution for the students in which the university was not originally designed for. [3,4]