Promising Practices for Improving STEM Education through Minority-Serving Institutions

About

Southern California Grantmakers’ College Access Group and the Education Funders Group are pleased to invite you to a panel discussion on the latest research from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NAS). Released in December 2018, the report, “Minority Serving Institutions: America’s Underutilized Resource for Strengthening the STEM Workforce,” examines promising practices for improving STEM education and research at the more than 700 Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs) in the United States—including hundreds of MSIs in California. SCG’s very own member, ECMC Foundation, is among the sponsors of the study.

MSIs provide more than 20 percent of the nation’s STEM bachelor’s degrees yet are often an overlooked resource for ensuring high quality education and training of the next generation of STEM-capable workers in the United States. The conversation will cover steps the postsecondary funding community can take to strengthen MSIs, from increasing college-industry-government partnerships to developing faculting and mentoring students along the range of STEM pathways.
The session will also include a discussion of one key intervention strategy that arose frequently—in the research and in the site visits undertaken by the committee:  The importance of mentoring in supporting the academic and social development of students at MSIs.  The National Academies have launched a new consensus study focused on the “science of mentoring,” and the value of mentoring will be discussed by the panel.
Speakers:

• Kilan Ashad-Bishop, Science Policy Fellow at the National Academy of Sciences
• Maria Dahlberg, Program Officer, Board on Higher Education & Workforce, National Academy of Sciences
• Lorelle Espinosa, Vice President, American Council on Education and Co-Chair of the National Academy of Sciences Study Committee on “Closing the Equity Gap.”
• Tom Rudin, Director, Board on Higher Education & Workforce, National Academy of Sciences
• Angela Sanchez, Program Officer, College Success, ECMC Foundation (Moderator)