Our program is called STEM Through Authentic Research and Training or
START program. In the STEM professions, there are certain demographics that are
underrepresented in the workforce. And so, the pipeline is really starting at
elementary school and working its way all the way through graduate school.
And along that pipeline, there's many leaks that happen. And so, what we've been focusing on is
why is that and then how can we disrupt that system, so that they can become a regular part
of the STEM pipeline. And we know that our communities -- especially our communities
of color -- often don't have the same kinds of opportunities that more affluent populations for
example, might have. So we started STEM camp -- actually my husband and I back in 2010.
It is a five-day, day camp experience where students in elementary and middle school and high
school come onto campus to have rich experiences and really getting their hands dirty and wet,
and just really getting to play -- engage in that STEM material even without realizing it’s STEM.
And we thought that pairing START with the STEM camps would be a really nice pipeline. Because
really, we're trying to build a STEM ecosystem so that we can think of
opportunities for our elementary, middle, high school students on into post-secondary education
and really provide students with a bunch of different opportunities that
in general weren't really available here in the Lexington and Central Kentucky area
prior to about 10 years ago. How can we create these opportunities for students to see STEM
in a different light to increase their STEM literacy, so that they do feel a sense of
belonging and do have some identity in STEM. A lab is like a family. And you got someone that's very
senior -- me -- and then you got students that are learning with you, and you learn from each other, right?
They become siblings, if you will. It's that near-peer mentoring that really builds
a strong foundation. And then you get students thinking, "I can do this. There's a student that's
a year or two older than me taking these classes. I work side-by-side with them. I could do that."
So we are an alliance of 10 institutions -- seven here in Kentucky, three in West Virginia -- and
we support students who are majoring in science, technology, engineering, and math.
Our main focuses are undergraduate research experiences, graduate school preparation,
in hopes that they will go beyond the bachelor's degree. So it's a natural synergy in
that we can use our current scholars to be peer mentors for the high school students, and then we
can also recruit the high school students as LSAMP participants once they get to college.
I hope the biggest impact is those who are participating are able to really think and dream
beyond what they thought they wanted to do, and be comfortable asking questions and comfortable
asking people about their career choices and their college choices, and really thinking and making
informed decisions rather than just, “Oh, this is all I know, so this is what I'm going to do.”
And one of the things that we've done in this project, is we have taken students who
already are on campus -- the LSAMP students -- and we're pairing them with students in
the high school realm and giving them access to things that they wouldn't normally have access to
in college. How do we empower these students to feel like they belong here? That they can
make a difference and they can actually be successful in STEM?
No one likes to be told what to do and that's why coaching is so effective. We're not telling
these students what to do. We're just giving them the opportunity to get clarity and find the right
steps for them. We're sitting students down and saying, “To be successful in college, you need
academic support, wellness support, and access to opportunity.” I believe that it's not accessible
right now for certain students through no fault of their own. If I can play a role in this in
supporting my colleagues who are underrepresented in providing the access to these students,
then I want to support them. One of the things that we are looking to initiate with the schools
is a segment which we’re tentatively calling, "Ask a professor" where we would have the students
actually come up with particular questions of interest to them, which would then be relayed
to myself or other faculty members. And then we can set up a Zoom call with an entire classroom
where we have a frank exchange of whatever topic it is. So the teachers are actually
the key gatekeepers in this particular process. Because they have contact with the students,
they can actually identify the students who would benefit the most from it or gain the most
moving forward. We got awarded the START Grant and right when we were getting ready to implement
our new ideas and bring on a bunch of students onto campus, COVID hit and really threw us for
a loop. And so, really thinking about that big pivot that we had to make and thinking about
virtual STEM experiences. And so, sometimes that means us masking up and going into a
laboratory with an iPad and asking questions and getting that experience, and sometimes that means
asking our partner Space Tango to think differently about their partnership with us.
With Space Tango in this region or in our backyard, these experiments that are done on the
Space Station are in the field of exomedicine. So can we use microgravity to find the cures
for diseases or solutions to our technology problems here on Earth? The importance of
Space Tango in an outside partner is for those students that are in their first generation
of going into higher education or into STEM, to see a pathway that there's a lot of different
options for them to get involved in this career. We can connect students to STEM
professionals who might have had a similar path to them, who want to really work and talk with
the students -- kind of break down those barriers of what it really is like to be in a STEM career.
It's unprecedented that a College of Medicine and a College of Education collaborate together on a
very education-heavy community-centered piece with the College of Medicine as the lead in a
very positive way. I think that spoke to NIH and I really think again that speaks to UK and
the community and the STEM community that we've built here. So I think the biggest impact it has
on the community is by demystifying science and demystifying STEM at the level of people who are
going to be the next generation. We can actually start at the grassroots by impacting individuals
who are at a very formative stage in their own development as people and their development of
understanding and logic and figuring out how the world really works, and provide them a framework
with which to actually understand the world around them. The more diversity and inclusion we have,
especially in the sciences, is just going to make this world a better place.