Welcome to our MSEIP presentation. We created a unique learning community with a cohort of students involved in academic activities outside the classroom. As they discovered their own potential and felt good about campus academic engagement, they influenced the larger school.  Students increasingly engaged in academics and spent more time in student spaces judiciously placed near STEM faculty offices. 

We appreciate any feedback and questions and also look forward to seeing and learning from your presentations. 

Wow! This program is so powerful. I love all the ways in which you built a sense of community between the students and faculty members. Was there any type or training or professional development you did with the researchers or mentors prior to them working with the high school students? 

Thanks Mariam.
Some of the TA-research mentors for the summer program had been with us through the year involved in MSEIP activities. We did have training for about 10days prior to the Summer program.

One of the strong components of our program was the strong student-faculty bonds that were forged. Also, our cohort students started getting involved with academics more/ They went on to become academic role models and helped other students  develop a passion for learning. We had many faculty members across the school contributing a couple of hours a week to engage students in projects, activities, and readings based on student interest.

The questions that come to mind are

i) Did your project have similarities to this model?

ii) What other ways are there to involve the larger school beyond the ones actually in the project. We did have classroom projects. We also created conferences nearby so that other students, faculty, and members of our college could attend easily.

iii) What other strategies have been used to foster interdisciplinary research with students and multiple faculty?

Look forward to thoughts and discussions.

What a fantastic program! I was glad to be a small part of a high school academy one summer. Keep up all the amazing work!

MSEIP provided an opportunity to encourage our students to explore new ideas and work in a team atmosphere. They learned by using scientific methods to gain knowledge and confidence in their academic abilities.  

This is a great program!  I love the Saturday's Speakers Program.  All of this community building is wonderful.  Thank you for sharing this work.

MSEIP equipped our students with unique skills involving interdisciplinary approach of learning. It allowed them to explore real world problems and  put into practice information learned through various disciplines involved. 

I think training students with hands-on research is the way to go. We all learn by working on a project, resolving challenges, and presenting our work to audiences. This is a wonderful experience for me as faculty. I enjoyed observing our students trained through this program publishing peer-reviewed papers and presenting at conferences. 

WoW! This was such a powerful community and institutional effort that is so exciting to learn about. I don't think the beginning graphic really captures how the community building, academic engagement, collaborative research, and professional support is intertwined and layered. I would love to learn more about the impact on students and their professional successes. Could you share more about this aspect of the program? 

Great things happen when students and faculty collaborate and learn! Well done MSEIP students and kudos to faculty!!

This all sounds great and encouraging for the students. Anything with Dr P involved is awesome, I miss the HSSU faculty and fun. #alumni #math Way to go everyone!

This all sounds great and encouraging for the students. Anything with Dr P involved is awesome, I miss the HSSU faculty and fun. #alumni #math Way to go everyone!

What an amazing project! As an educator in a university museum, I got a lot of ideas from your program model, especially the student mentoring and how the competition brought people together to learn from each other in really positive ways.

Thank you for sharing this project and creating a STEM community for students and faculty. I am curious to know what your recruitment efforts entailed for MSEIP. 

My high school students gained an immersive enrichment experience that gave them insight into STEM careers, which they would not have received in their regular high school curriculum. Even during the COVID pandemic, the MSEIP program engaged the students in a Virtual Learning Environment which provided them valuable experience with the simulations and other virtual activities. The MSEIP experience inspired them to take STEM courses in college and pursue careers in STEM fields.

Excellent project! Wonderful job you are doing in your project. I was very impressed that you are incorporating the use of GIS in this project. It is definitely a powerful tool that opens opportunities, as the student pointed out.

Do you have a specific course where you teach GIS, or is it incorporated in another course?

Definitely interested in trying to do something with GIS in my project.

Thank you for sharing this video showcase of HSSU's MSEIP. It is clear that the MSEIP is having a profound and positive impact on students and faculty alike. A former MSEIP student will be leading a Canopy Crew of youth to conduct tree health assessments throughout St. Louis, as a part of the Treesilience program, and we could not be more excited to have in our team. We are very grateful to HSSU and the MSEIP for the engagement and collaboration over the years. Thank you!

Thank you for sharing this amazing project. I am wondering how you are measuring the impact of the program? Any examples of metrics or outcomes are appreciated. Thank you.

Grateful to know my Father (Andrew Jackson) is involved in such an important & necessary program. 

What an inspiring project. I love hearing about all the ways collaboration comes into play in this higher ed learning environment. And especially value the call out of "learning aside" professors. I'm so impressed by the career pathways that were shared of participants. Are there plans to continue the program beyond the life of the grant? 

It seems you have a great model that is engaging and motivating for both students and educators/researchers. Could you say more about how you have or plan to make this model self-sustaining? What guidance can you offer teams at other institutions about how to imbed this model as a self-sustaining learning opportunity?  Or, is that a challenge that you are still pursuing?

Hi Fran,

     We now have the equipment, knowhow and collaborations established for research  continuance and internships.  In fact we are in process of getting a joint position with a neighboring university collaborator with GIS in mind.  We have a certificate program in GIS getting ready to be rolled out. Some of our faculty are involved with the Danforth Plant Science center in Grant activities (Dr. Podleski is involved in this).

We are recipients of a sub-grant which includes interdisciplinary plant Phenotyping and Geoscience research. A fellow faculty member and I used the MSEIP purchased instruments to do intercropping research through another Grant  in our Greenhousethis past year. 

We have built strong relations with organizations like the Nature Conservancy and other organizations and institutions for further collaborations.

I am in talks with fellow faculty to look for funding campus engagement (Journal, book clubs, research reading, speaker series, etc) like our Saturday program.  It will be like a new beginning in some sense because COVID effects shut down a lot of on-campus engagement.  We realized that for many of our students the Physical in person on-campus engagement trumps the conveniences of virtual engagement. We plan to resurrect  on-campus engagement with many aspects of the MSEIP model in mind.

Hi Nancy,

We would look at MSEIP student retention, graduation, and post-graduation career paths. Also post-MSEIP involvement in other opportunities. For some MSEIP students it was a stepping-stone and they often have continued mentorship with the MSEIP faculty because of the strong bonds forged by the experience. Some of then went on to be TAs as part of other programs but were often a TA for a MSEIP faculty class. We have kept up with our yearly cohorts.

We had surveys from the Summer school for the high school teachers, and students, faculty, and MSEIP TAs to get information on student engagement and content. We also had assessments during the Summer program for content, research, and presentation.

In addition, we had data from faculty surveys of all faculty involved with MSEIP, the percentage of MSEIP (former or current) who presented at Conferences whether they presented MSEIP or other projects. 12 of 20 accepted presentations for the 2019 ERN conference were current or former MSEIP students. Three of the other 8 later joined the MSEIP program (2 for our Summer Academy. We also had research projects that resulted in a publication with a MSEIP student as one of the authors in a refereed Remote Sensing Journal. This student presented at the American Geophysical Union international conference. Another MSEIP student won an award at the GEO-Resolution conference (3rd place for their poster). We also have former students in Grad. programs, technical jobs, environmental companies, and professional programs (dentistry, pharmacy, nursing).

MSEIP's flexibility of ways in which students could be engaged - projects research, TA or combinations of these helped students chose what suited them best and also look for other opportunities off and on campus as they learned about their interests. We followed them through their continued path in other programs. We also looked at the number of MSEIP students who got internships in the Summer at various universities, and organizations.

We also had projects in our courses and some MSEIP students helped the students in some of the classes with these. Even when we first went virtual, we had MSEIP students engage virtually as TAs and project helpers in some courses. We used the CURE test to evaluate our class projects.

There were multiple programs that some of these students were involved in over the course of their undergraduate years that impacted them and MSEIP was a very strong stepping-stone for them to transition to other programs. They got a stipend for campus academic activities and connected with faculty and fellow students. The stipend helped them be on campus more and not have to look for jobs off campus. Our MSEIP students definitely impacted the larger school. They got students from their different STEM majors to come and work in campus spaces, MSEIP students would stay and study on Saturday after the morning program. Soon other students were coming in on those days (pre-COVID).

This is a great project.  What would be the essential steps for others to start a similar project without funding?

Thanks for the insights!

 I so appreciated hearing from the students - thanks for centering their voices!  You mentioned a 10-training you held - for TAs and other non-students involved in the work - can you offer any details about that training?

Also - the offer of a stipend so students did not need to seek jobs outside campus is a crucial component. A very real way to begin to level the academic playing field!

Hi Cali,

Prior to COVID when we had in-person instruction, the TAs would come in and work on some of the labs, with the instructors who were teaching them. During the virtual Academies the TAs had to do the virtual labs and make sure they did them more than once so they knew exactly what was involved. We also had a session discussing the academy and expectations.. In the last academy the TAs were actually doing much of the instruction (supervised) so they had to have their lesson plans ahead of time as well and they would be looked at, edited, and they would do practice sessions with each other and the PI.

For all the summer academies, the mentoring part was easy because they already took it seriously, and they wanted to make a difference. New Summer inductees (TAs) were helped by those already there. Classes in our Summer Academies, typically had an HSSU instructor, high school students, TAs, and at least one high-school teacher. Students were in groups so different classes went on in different rooms. Also we had projects run by a person hired for that and they would also meet the TAs and go over their expectations of the TAs. There were also Kahoot and Jeopardy quizzes that TAs had to set up based on the words and terminology related to the lessons.  

We had already established strong faculty-student bonds with some of the TAs over the course of the year and these TAs which made it a lot easier. 

WOW! 

Its amazing to see how influential the MSEIP program has been to so many student's career paths including my own! I hope that more students have the opportunity to participate in programs just like this! It will enhance their growth as a student and help build crucial skills as they continue through their academic journey - and beyond. 

I really enjoyed this video. The insight from this video provided me with so much understanding and all the different subjects that sit under the MISEP umbrella! I enjoyed hearing from each student. As an a former undergraduate student I found myself being able to relate to what they were saying or what skill set they were able to strengthen. Providing students with these kinds of experiences and opportunities to prior to graduate schoo or their career has such a huge impact and that clear! Go HSSU! 

What a great program and loved seeing all the comments, questions etc.  Appreciate your providing stipends to offset the need for these students to work during the academic year - this is certainly key for full participation.  Was not sure how many years students participate, did they move into leadership roles as they progressed through the program (from year to year).  I can see them working on a research project and then helping the next cohort as a "seasoned" researcher on that project.  

Hi John, 

Some students stayed on in MSEIP and. took on leadership roles. Others in our Cohort joined other research Grants or even became TAs through other grants and were in our shared student spaces as role models for other students. 

Our Summer Academy TAs included some MSEIP students we had worked with during the year. MSEIP also helped us connect to other students who came to our shared spaces, and they would then become part of the pool. 

When we started, we had a notion that we would have this cohort with limited numbers of graduating seniors and the others would stay, groom a new set, before they graduated. As the Grant progressed and we got to know students, we realized that some of them were ready to move on to new opportunities. Sometimes, we had students who we considered half-MSEIP so they could do MSEIP some of the time and other things at others. There was a lot of flexibility. We also had students leave in the Summer and come back in the fall.  

A dedicated and committed faculty and TA collaboration.  I am very familiar with their outstanding efforts to engage and motivate students toward and in STEM fields and studies. This was a specific initiative in their ongoing and successful efforts.

Wow, what an amazing program this was! We need more programs like this. Excellent job to all participants and faculty. 

What a cool project! Truly needed. Hope the project model and findings will be widely disseminated to benefit more students!

This is so amazing. I am a proud Harris-Stowe Alum and seeing the growth of the Arts and Sciences at Harris-Stowe is so encouraging. I recall participating in a sustainability project and just knowing the students have so many resources and support. I am very happy about reach they have with the students. I know Harris-Stowe Mathematics Department changed my life. 

Great Work… It is truly amazing to see what students can do when they have the support and dedication of faculty. You can see and hear passion that both the students and faculty have for MSEIP and the experiences provided. 

What an amazing program. You have not only set students up for success in numerous ways, you are building community. Big congrats!

The MESIP project at Harris-Stowe State University is yet another example of how success happens when access, funding resources, and faculty mentoring is provided to develop and strengthen student talents through undergraduate research. Involving our students in undergraduate research opens doors for graduate school aspirations and desires that further the participation of underrepresented minority students in STEM. Our HSSU faculty and faculty friends from other academic institutions made this project a success for our students. I am proud of the outcomes that were generated from this wonderful work.