Gary May       

This presentation will summarize three key programmatic efforts at the Georgia Institute of Technology directed at clearing STEM pathways for minority students. In the first program, undergraduate students who have completed their junior year are provided summer and academic year research experiences as a means of promoting their interest in research and graduate school attendance. The academic year research program provides students with valuable research experience, while also developing oral and written communication skills through annual seminars where the students present the results of their research to faculty and students in their departments. Last year, the “Summer Undergraduate Research in Science/Engineering” (SURE) Program continued its strong momentum as it entered its 12th year, with an enrollment of 26 students from 19 different universities. The program has been very successful. Approximately 90% of SURE's 193 total previous participants have gone to graduate school, and nearly half of those have come to Georgia Tech. In 1999, one of these students received our Outstanding Ph.D. Thesis Award.

The second initiative, FOCUS, was developed and implemented at Georgia Institute of Technology to expose minority undergraduates to the potential benefits of an advanced degree.  FOCUS is a three and one-half day event held annually, open to all disciplines within Georgia Tech’s six colleges. FOCUS constituents include four groups, Friends – high school seniors, Scholars – undergraduate students, Fellows – senior Ph.D. students and professionals considering academia, and Alumni – graduate alumni.  FOCUS offers exposure to academic, research-related, cultural, and professional development information and resources germane to applying to and succeeding in graduate school.  On average, 250 – 300 participants attend each year.  Within the College of Engineering (CoE), the average number of degrees conferred to African Americans has increased 100% for MS and 250% for PhD since the inception of FOCUS.  In that same time span, FOCUS participants accounted for 30% of the African Americans enrolling in CoE graduate programs.  The retention rate among those students is 92%. 

The third initiative is called “Facilitating Academic Careers in Engineering and Science” (FACES). FACES, which operates under the sponsorship of the National Science Foundation’s Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP) program, is a collaborative effort between the Georgia Institute of Technology, Morehouse College, and Spelman College. Initiated in 1998, FACES supports graduate students on supplemental doctoral fellowships throughout their matriculation through graduate school. This support is provided by means of a stipend that increases in value as the student meets the critical milestones along the way toward the Ph.D. degree. Over the five-year duration of the program, 43 graduate students have been thus supported.  Furthermore, over that same approximate span, a total of 103 underrepresented students have received Ph.D. degrees in science or engineering – near the most in such fields in the nation. In one unique aspect of the FACES program, senior doctoral candidates at Georgia Tech annually compete for $20,000 Career Initiation Grants (CIGs), which they may use as start-up funds to assist them in establishing their research programs in their initial academic appointments. Since 1998, nine such grants have been awarded. One past CIG recipient, Professor Mark Lewis of the University of Michigan, recently received the prestigious National Science Foundation CAREER Award (2002).