The engineering department at completed a 6-year S-STEM grant project in 2017. In this poster the successes and shortcomings of this project are presented and evaluated. Issues addressed include appropriate levels of funding for incoming freshmen and recommendations of funding levels for upperclassmen along with incentive bonuses for significant academic achievement. Cohort size is discussed along with the complications of drawing significant conclusions from small cohorts. A job shadowing experience is discussed along with lessons learned about the selection of appropriate personnel for shadowing partners. Issues of student compliance with scholarship terms including continued enrollment in a STEM major, maintaining a minimum GPA, and meeting academic progress standards are discussed along with lessons learned from working with the university financial aid office to ensure proper implementation and distribution of the scholarship funds and removal of funds from student accounts for students no longer satisfying scholarship terms. Social activities and professional development opportunities are discussed with recommendations for improvement of these activities for future projects. The poster also introduces ways that the opportunities the grant funds may provide for students in addition to scholarship funding may be better communicated to the students such as opportunities to attend professional conferences.
Dr. Ricky Castles is an assistant professor in the Department of Engineering at East Carolina University. He is primarily affiliated with the ECU Electrical Engineering concentration. His research work focuses on the use of wireless sensor networks, microcontrollers, and physiological data collection for a variety of applications. He is also interested in engineering education research including leadership development, broadening participating, and opportunities for first generation college students.
Dr. Brown is Director of Extension Research and Development at North Carolina State University. She works for Industry Expansion Solutions, the extension arm of the NC State College of Engineering. Most of her research is in the area of applying industrial engineering techniques to health care process improvement. However, she also does research in the area of STEM education. Dr. Brown has published education-related research in INFORMS Transactions on Education, Proceedings of the 2009 ASEE National Meeting, and Proceedings of the 2008 ASEE Southeast Section Meeting. While working at East Carolina University, she was PI on an NSF S-STEM grant in the amount of $599,894.
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