To strengthen the connection between the statistical community and National Science Foundation, we continue the series introduced in the May 2023 issue that poses questions to NSF program officers and awardees. If you have questions or comments for the program officers, send them to ASA Director of Science Policy Steve Pierson at spierson@amstat.org.
This month’s program officer is from the Division of Undergraduate Education in the Directorate for STEM Education (EDU) at the National Science Foundation. The awardees are from several universities and were awarded funding from the division’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (S-STEM) program.
Michael Ferrara is a permanent program director in the Division of Undergraduate Education at the National Science Foundation. He earned a doctorate in mathematics from Emory University in 2005 and was a professor in the department of mathematical and statistical sciences at the University of Colorado Denver from 2009–2020. Ferrara maintains active research programs in extremal combinatorics and undergraduate STEM education. He co-leads the NSF Hispanic-Serving Institutions program, serves as co-lead of the NSF S-STEM program, and works on the mathematics and data science clusters of the Improving Undergraduate STEM Education program.
Tell us about the Division of Undergraduate Education and its programs.
Undergraduate education in the United States is exceptionally broad, and DUE reflects that. Our signature program, Improving Undergraduate STEM Education in the Directorate for STEM Education, supports projects to improve STEM teaching and learning for undergraduate students, including studying what works and for whom and how to transform institutions to adopt successful STEM practices. We have scholarship programs to support talented, low-income students (NSF Scholarships in STEM) and future K–12 STEM teachers (Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program). Other opportunities focus on undergraduate STEM education at two-year colleges (Improving Undergraduate STEM Education Innovation in Two-Year College STEM Education program and Advanced Technical Education program) and Hispanic-serving institutions.
Do the programs support statisticians and data scientists?
Yes, absolutely! We have so many excellent projects across our programs led by members of the ASA community. Some of these projects are centered on statistics and/or data science education, while others require data expertise to carry out research or evaluation activities. DUE has many awards led by statisticians and data scientists.
What advice would you give to a potential proposal writer, whether a first-time or returning applicant?
When writing a proposal for a DUE program, be sure to tell the story of your institution and the students you want to serve. Make a strong case that the work is aligned with your local context and is in touch with students’ strengths, needs, and realities. Also, be sure the key components of your proposal are clear and a reader can understand what you are asking of students, faculty, and other participants. Reviewers appreciate being able to visualize a potential project ‘end-to-end.’
Is there anything else we should know about DUE?
Innovative undergraduate education is happening in classrooms across the nation. Consequently, DUE welcomes and funds proposals from institutions of every size, shape, mission, and geographic area. If you have an idea you think could make for a great project, reach out to any DUE program officer and we can happily arrange for a 30-minute consultation to provide feedback.
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A team including Michael Ludkovski of the University of California at Santa Barbara, Abel Rodriguez of the University of Washington, Dan Gillen of the University of California at Irvine, Judith Canner of California State University, Monterey Bay, Andrew Schaffner of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, Ayona Chatterjee of California State University, East Bay, and Kyle Hasenstab of San Diego State University received $5 million from the Division of Undergraduate Education’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (S-STEM) program.
Tell us about your project, including its motivation and goal.
The Pacific Alliance for Low-Income Inclusion in Statistics and Data Science is a cohort-based bridge program that aims to increase degree completion by low-income, high-achieving undergraduates with demonstrated financial need, as well as the number of these students who pursue graduate degrees in statistics and data science.
The alliance is composed of the following seven public universities:
- University of California, Santa Barbara (lead institution)
- University of California at Irvine
- University of Washington
- California State University, Monterey Bay
- Cal Poly San Luis Obispo
- California State University, East Bay
- San Diego State University
Program scholars receive need-based scholarships of up to $10,000 per year during the last two years of their undergraduate degree and the first year of their graduate education. They also receive academic and career support through faculty and graduate student mentoring, a series of monthly events held both online and in person that help build community and introduce students to a variety of topics and statistics and data science professionals, and support in preparing for and applying to statistics and data science graduate programs.
Describe your approach to the Division of Undergraduate Education.
The mission of the Undergraduate Education Division is to “promote excellence in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education for all students.” This means contributions to STEM education (both in terms of workforce development and research on undergraduate education) are critical to the success of proposals submitted to DUE.
In the case of our proposal, this was manifested in two ways. The S-STEM solicitation allows for submissions under the following three tracks:
- Track 1 (Institutional Capacity Building)
- Track 2 (Implementation: Single Institution)
- Track 3 (Inter-Institutional Consortia)
Our program was submitted under Track 3.
Two key goals shared by all tracks are to “provide scholarships to domestic low-income academically promising students with demonstrated financial need pursuing a degree in one of the S-STEM eligible disciplines” and to “adapt and implement evidence-based curricular and co-curricular activities.” Therefore, success required a team that was knowledgeable of the STEM education literature, and the proposal needed to demonstrate this.
Furthermore, unlike Track 1 and Track 2, proposals under Track 3 are expected to “engage in high quality educational or social sciences research to advance understanding of how to adapt, implement and scale up effective evidence-based programs and practices designed to foster positive outcomes for low-income students in STEM.” This meant our team needed to not only be aware of the STEM education literature, but also needed to include members at the forefront of such research.
We were lucky to partner with the Center for Evaluation & Research for STEM Equity at the University of Washington for the research component of the project. I believe this played a key role in getting the proposal funded.
Another aspect that often gets overlooked in many NSF proposals with a heavy educational emphasis is the need to have a strong evaluation team. This is another place where we were lucky by teaming with the Center for Science & Engineering Partnerships at the University of California at Santa Barbara.
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