Jerome Lavelle

The Collaborative Summer Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Program provides high impact ten-week summer REU??????????????????s to underrepresented minority (URM) students who are rising sophomores, juniors, and seniors attending North Carolina State University (NCSU), St. Augustine??????????????????s University, Durham Technical Community College, or Johnston Community College (please see letters of support from these partner institutions). This summer REU program will increase minority access to high quality undergraduate research experiences by providing engineering research opportunities in laboratories at NCSU under the direction of College of Engineering (COE) faculty members. Students will receive a stipend to work on collaborative research projects which partner students from NCSU, a historically black college/university, and a community/technical college on research teams. Participating in a collaborative research experience will teach participants to capitalize on one another??????????????????s existing technical knowledge and problem-solving skill set to investigate a research question developed in collaboration with a NCSU Engineering faculty advisor. Each collaborative research team will contain no more than three student researchers. In addition to gaining valuable early research experience, participants will have access to benefits such as: 1) an increased understanding of the roles and responsibilities of faculty members in a research-intensive academic environment; 2) increased awareness of campus resources; and 3) professional networking and development opportunities. Collaborative REU participants will be selected from an applicant pool collectively recruited by each of the partner institutions. Students will be selected to participate based upon their academic credentials and articulated research interests, and will conduct research under the direction of an NCSU Engineering faculty member whose research is the most optimal match for their interests. Summer REU participants will be take an introductory research methods course during the REU which will teach participants core research fundamentals such as: conducting an effective literature review, research ethics, data collection methods and quality control, research presentations, and other foundational research topics. Participants will also attend a ????????????????Graduate Diversity Speaker Series??????????????? where presenters from diverse ethnic backgrounds and genders will provide students with their unique insights into research related to the Engineering Grand Challenges, tips for applying to and funding graduate school, and STEM research career opportunities in both academic and non-academic environments. The proposed initiative will also provide opportunities for student researchers to gain experience in disseminating their research findings at the NCLSAMP Annual Research Conference as well as the annual NCSU Undergraduate Summer Research Symposium.

This RET proposal will incorporate stratified teams of engineering graduate students, undergraduate students, in-service K-12 teachers, pre-service K-12 teachers and community college faculty into engineering labs for a research experience. The teams will stay together during the year to support implementation of engineering activities in the K-12 classroom. NC State will partner with UNC-Charlotte.

North Carolina State University has a fundamental commitment to increasing educational opportunities in science, engineering and mathematics (SEM), for the state's population. In meeting the challenge of developing a new and more diverse work force for this state and nation, the university is uniquely positioned to play a major role. As the largest Research I institution in the state, and one of the largest engineering colleges in the country that successfully attracts and graduates large numbers of underrepresented minority students, NC State University has the potential for significantly increasing the regional and national pool of well-prepared underrepresented SEM graduates. This proposal seeks to build on existing programs that are uniquely designed to specifically address the needs of underrepresented SEM students. This proposal includes substantial student participant activities and programs that are designed to recruit, attract, retain, and graduate a larger number of underrepresented minorities earning engineering degrees. Our proposal contains direct support for three identifiable, but overlapping components: 1) The NC State University Summer Transition Program; 2) Student Advancement and Retention Teams, a formal new minority engineering freshman mentoring program; and 3) NC-LSAMP Program Administration.

North Carolina State University has a fundamental commitment to increasing educational opportunities in science, engineering and mathematics (SEM), for the state?s population. In meeting the challenge of developing a new and more diverse work force for this state and nation, the university is uniquely positioned to play a major role. As the largest Research I institution in the state, and one of the largest engineering colleges in the country that successfully attracts and graduates large numbers of underrepresented minority students, NC State University has the potential for significantly increasing the regional and national pool of well-prepared underrepresented SEM graduates. This proposal seeks to build on existing programs that are uniquely designed to specifically address the needs of underrepresented SEM students. This proposal includes substantial student participant activities and programs that are designed to recruit, attract, retain, and graduate a larger number of underrepresented minorities earning engineering degrees. Our proposal contains direct support for three identifiable, but overlapping components: 1) The NC State University Summer Transition Program; 2) Student Advancement and Retention Teams ? a formal new minority engineering freshman mentoring program; and 3) NC-LSAMP Program Administration.

This proposal puts into place an essential and cost effective component to help to fill the engineering work force needs identified in the aerospace work force study. This NCCCS and UNC project team will develop key course materials, which are essential components to make the AS in Engineering a viable and growing program across the NCCCS. The project will allow these engineering courses to be widely available to support program expansion in a cost effective and collegial basis acrosss the community college system. The project is a strategic win for all the partners. The project jump starts the NCCCS capability to advance the interests of approximately 20 community colleges in delivering this degree. For the UNC engineering programs, the project provides a cost effective pathway to allow students to advance through the freshman and sophomore years. It also enhances collaboration opportuniites with the NCCCS. Finally, it meets the needs of students for access to advanced career opportunities and it provides a regional engineering workforce for employers. The courses identifed for development are a part of the reconfigured AS in engineering (pre- major degree) and are required by a number of engineering disciplines related to the aerospace industry including industrial, mechanical, materials, civil, and aerospace.

K-12 schools across the nation are implementing or considering implementing various curricula that use engineering. From high school curricula that are fairly comprehensive (i.e. Project Lead the Way) to textbooks intended for middle or high school courses (i.e. Survey of Engineering from Great Lakes Press) to elementary school after school clubs based on activities from engineering societies and more comprehensive sets of activities (i.e. Engineering is Elementary from the Museum of Science, Boston), enthusiam for engineering in K-12 is increasing. These curricular activites have different foci from increasing technological literacy to encouraging students to pursue engineering. Although those of us who are engineers are enthusiatic about this trend, to date, there is only cursory assessment data available to indicate the efficacy of any of these approaches to meeting their respective goals. Consequently, there is no guarantee that the overall affect on the fields of engineering won?t be negative, if these activities become nothing more than an educational ?fad.? Solid research on the abililty of engineering curricula to support solid student learning is needed. This proposal describes a project designed to comprehensively assess student learning with an elementary school curriculum (Engineering is Elementary) and a comprehensive implementation in math, science, language arts, social studies and technological literacy. North Carolina State University Colleges of Engineering and Education propose to partner with Wake and New Hanover County Public Schools, the Museum of Science, Boston and MCNC to support existing implementations of engineering magnet elementary schools in each county. The implementation will be extensively studied with regards to the goals of increasing student learning for all subgroups of students, with a focus on decreasing achievement gaps between subgroups.

This program will translate emerging nanoscale materials and device engineering research at the College of Engineering into undergraduate learning opportunities for students in multiple disciplines, specifically targeting the increased analytical understanding of processes and engineering design considerations related to physical phenomena at the nanoscale. Three (3) undergraduate student populations will be affected, with learning outcomes quantified: 1.) future nanotechnology engineering practitioners (Materials Science and Engineering students); 2) future engineers impacted by nanoscience advances (Engineers from across the College of Engineering); and 3) future K-12 nanoscience teachers (Science Education majors). Nanoscale engineering concepts will be taught with new curricular content, as well as quantified comparisons of learning outcomes between different student populations.