This grant provides renewal funds to the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) to continue the design and facilitation of a hybrid learning community for grantees of Sloan’s Creating Equitable Pathways to STEM Graduate Education (Equitable Pathways) initiative, which invests in educational pathways from Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) to STEM graduate programs nationwide.   AAAS takes a three-pronged approach to advance projects, partnerships, and pathways within the grantee community. Namely, 1) leveraging collective action, shared capacity building, and equitable practices to accelerate change; 2) empowering and equipping Sloan grantees to integrate sustainable practices toward creating lasting and long-term impact; and 3) generating and disseminating knowledge that advances understanding of equitable partnerships between MSIs and non-MSIs.   Funded activities under this grant include, orchestrating a suite of virtual offerings, including monthly cohort and quarterly community sessions that promote learning and discussion both within and across grantee cohorts; providing access to AAAS’s online SEA Change resources, such as synchronous and asynchronous courses, joint virtual sessions with SEA Change members, and community interviews with leading subject matter experts; hosting an annual in-person, joint conference for Equitable Pathways community participants and the broader SEA Change community; and developing and conducting mixed-methods research that will identify the key determinants of equitable, productive, and long-lasting relationships between MSIs and their institutional partners.

This grant funds an expansion of an ongoing partnership between the University of Puerto Rico, Cayey and the University of Buffalo to create sustainable pathways for undergraduate students at Puerto Rican universities to successfully pursue graduate degrees in chemistry.  Grant funds will allow the partnership to expand by adding two undergraduate institutions in Interamerican University of Puerto Rico at Bayamón and Arecibo and one graduate partner in Texas A&M University. The collaboration’s activities center on hosting outreach seminars and other recruitment initiatives on the Puerto Rican campuses; selecting 6 students each year to participate in a 10-week summer research and mentoring program at Buffalo and Texas A&M; providing additional academic enrichment activities for selected participants during the academic year and summer; and providing paths to admission into University of Buffalo and Texas A&M graduate programs. Other activities include embedding graduate preparation workshops into existing curriculum at UPRC, expanding mentor training to more faculty at Buffalo and Texas A&M, and initiating transition awards for students who decide to pursue graduate study.

The Mathematical Sciences Research Institute Undergraduate Program (MSRI-UP) at the Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute (SLMath, formerly MSRI) is a comprehensive six-week summer program for undergraduate students who demonstrate exceptional potential for and interest in pursuing graduate studies in mathematics. The goal is to identify talented students, especially those from underrepresented groups, and make available to them meaningful research opportunities and a community of academic peers and mentors. Each year, MSRI-UP invites 18 students to the UC Berkeley campus, where their academic curriculum consists of two weeks of structured coursework followed by four weeks of supervised, group research. Additionally, students attend workshops on applying for and succeeding in graduate school, including career conversations with professional mathematicians. Weekly research colloquia feature a variety of mathematical topics and applications. At the end of the summer, students produce formal reports and give oral presentations on their research to their cohort and invited guests. MSRI-UP programming continues throughout the following year, focused on how to present work at research conferences, submit articles for publication, and eventually apply for graduate school.