“It means that I am not alone and I’ve got resources and opportunities that I just need to put effort into. It is nice to know that someone cares about my education and wants to help me succeed.”
-PRISM scholar from Century College who transferred to Augsburg University
“Going to Normandale and being introduced to the PRISM Scholarship was a way to find a family heading toward the same goal that I wanted, and through joining that community, I was able to be connected to the right people who shared the ideas and the directions that I need to achieve my goals.”
-PRISM scholar from Normandale Community College who transferred to and graduated from Augsburg University
“The NSF program provided me with the opportunity to explore my curiosities as a budding scientist in ways that have opened many opportunities for me. The program and support it has provided has given me confidence to know that my hard work and academic strengths are noticed, celebrated, encouraged, and are set to finish with upstanding support and success.”
-PRISM scholar from Minneapolis College who transferred to Augsburg University
The navigational capital Yosso (2005) defines for students of color is plentiful in our community college students. They are persistent, self-reliant, and eager to belong. However, as Dr. Xueli Wang points out in her book, On My Own, “self-initiative and agency can only go so far, as clearly, the transfer path is one that is filled with intricacies and convolutions.” (Wang, 2020) This is where PRISM comes in. “A person not a place” is a theme that guides our work. For example, when the scholars quoted above intended to transfer to Augsburg, we personally introduced them to the program director and faculty in their field long before their transfer rather than just sending them to admissions. By making sure students have multiple points of contact and a sense of community, we hope to increase their ease and success of transfer.
PRISM Overview
Partner Relationships to Increase STEM Momentum (PRISM) is an NSF S-STEM program that supports the retention, transfer, and graduation of high-achieving, low-income students pursuing bachelor’s degrees in STEM. This collaborative project provides scholarships as well as high impact practices, such as internships and research experiences, for over 230 students over a five-year period at Augsburg University, Century College, Minneapolis College, and Normandale Community College. What makes PRISM special is the way our institutions collaborate. We provide a network of individuals committed to help students navigate transfer from community colleges to university STEM programs, ensuring that the transition is as smooth as possible. It’s a true team effort, dedicated to making sure these talented students have all the support they need to succeed.
Relationship Building
PRISM’s success is due largely to the strong leadership and team collaboration we’ve fostered between institutions. At the outset, we prioritized building relationships through regular check-ins and break-out room discussions during our team-wide Zoom meetings. During in-person gatherings, we made sure to socialize before the meeting and during lunch, which helped strengthen our bonds. Some of our principal investigators even attended S-STEM PI conferences together, which provided an opportunity to meet face-to-face and further build our relationships.
The PI leadership team of PRISM. From left to right: Professors Joann Pfeiffer, Rebekah Dupont, Karen Anderson, Renu Kumar.
These efforts have paid off tremendously. Good relationships have infused a sense of trust and respect within our leadership team. We take pride in the equitable partnership we’ve established together between community college and university faculty. There’s no sense of division, hidden hierarchy, or condescension—just a shared commitment to our goals and a mutual respect for each other’s contributions.
Communication
At PRISM, we place a high value on communication. We make a conscious effort to hear and appreciate every voice and idea. Besides our monthly Zoom meetings, we have an annual professional development day focused on mentorship, a program planning day, frequent emails, and a biweekly newsletter to keep everyone in the loop.
Scheduling can be tricky, so when no single monthly meeting time worked for everyone, we offered two options. Our program director and staff attend both meetings to ensure consistency. Plus, we record these Zoom meetings and take detailed shared notes on discussions and action items. This way, everyone stays informed and included, no matter their schedule.
In addition to team-wide planning meetings, as part of the PROSPECT S-STEM Hub one co-PI from each of the four schools meets together biweekly for two hours virtually or in person. This sub-team not only leads the PROSPECT work but also ends up serving as a steering committee for PRISM. Having frequent, fairly-long meetings when all four people can attend increases the level of collaboration between the schools and cohesiveness of the project.
Collaborative Mentorship
“The benefit of it is that I get someone to talk to about my fears and dreams regarding college and what I want to do academically and career wise. Basically, just connecting with someone on things I am not experienced with or to just check in and catch things I wasn’t aware of, like the resources and services……. When I told my mentor about it, I found out something I never even considered.”
-PRISM Scholar from Minneapolis College
“My mentor and I meet weekly. We talk about everything really; career, family, spiritual life, our health. He has become a confidant of mine for any troubles I’m having.”
-PRISM Scholar from Century College
Our project provides every scholar with a STEM faculty mentor, usually in their field of study. Collaboration continues to play a role in mentorship. For example, since Century College had many computer science scholars with fewer faculty mentors in that field, a computer science faculty member from Augsburg co-mentors with a non-computer science Century faculty.
To assist our 70 faculty members in their mentoring role, we have hosted annual professional development events for our mentors, scholars, and leadership team led by Christine Pfund of CIMER, Becky Wai-Ling Packard, and Ileana Vasu. We also held a STEM Transfer Pathway event to help PRISM S-STEM Scholars to achieve seamless transfer to bachelor’s degree programs. Faculty mentors, scholars, advisors, and transfer specialists from different institutions came together to share practical information to help support the transfer process and build community.
Photo from Transfer Pathway Workshop at Minneapolis College, October 2023.
Common Goals and Local Contexts
Each of the four institutions implements common programming elements including regular cohort meetings, faculty mentorship, and professional development opportunities for both scholars and mentors. Rather than a one-size-fits-all approach, PRISM leaders at each institution adapt implementation details and logistics to their local contexts. This combination of common goals with variations in implementation often leads to productive conversations about how best to navigate educational systems from a student perspective as well as how to implement an S-STEM grant.
Sample PRISM scholar roadmap contextualized to Minneapolis College.
Our PRISM scholar roadmap illustrates this working approach. Inspired by a scholar suggestion shared with our external evaluator, the roadmap highlights key program elements common across all institutions. A sub-team of co-PIs developed the roadmap template, which was then contextualized by each PRISM institution. The figure above illustrates the roadmap from Minneapolis College. Two other cross-institutional collaborations resulted in a PRISM website for all four schools and institutional data transfer usage agreements (DTUA’s) that support PRISM knowledge generation (Ajayi, 2023).
External Partnerships
PRISM Scholar poster session at the S-STEM Scholars Meeting, September 2023.
We’ve been strategic in expanding the reach of PRISM through partnerships with existing programs and opportunities. The Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation North Star STEM Alliance (LS-NSSA) provides our students with access to professional development events, such as “Applying for Paid Research Experiences in STEM” and “Demystifying the Graduate School Selection & Application Process,” and industry visits. Our collaboration with LS-NSSA has expanded undergraduate research opportunities. With support from 3M, LS-NSSA has developed a novel research program where students dedicate 3-4 hours a day to research over 4-5 weeks. This shorter commitment is less intimidating and allows students to balance summer research with classes or part-time jobs. Even during COVID, we adapted by conducting virtual epidemiology research using public databases. PRISM funds are used to pay stipends for some of our scholars participating in these valuable experiences.
Additionally, PRISM scholars have the chance to participate in MnDRIVE, a partnership between the University of Minnesota and the State of Minnesota. Each summer, MnDRIVE provides research positions specifically for PRISM scholars.
PRISM Scholar poster session at the S-STEM Scholars Meeting, September 2023.
Conclusion
At PRISM we strive to foster connections with each student and learn about their goals so that we can connect them to resources beyond our home institutions. Doing this before, during, and after transfer can make critical differences. Connections between faculty, mentors, advisors, and scholars across our PRISM institutions help us to collaboratively guide students in ways that can reduce credit loss, optimize preparation for their majors, and increase participation in competitive scholarships, internships, and research programs.
We believe our collaboration provides an ecosystem of support that contributes to STEM identity development and sense of belonging. Results of our knowledge generation led by Alex Ajayi suggests scholars’ level of self-reported STEM identity is higher than the means reported in the existing literature and compared to other S-STEM scholar recipients (McDonald et al., 2019). These findings highlight the strong sense of STEM identity and belonging within our scholar community. Through equitable collaboration between community college and university faculty, we are improving transfer one student at a time.
“The PRISM scholarship has enhanced my academics, my extracurricular involvement, and personal life in ways I never suspected.”
-PRISM Scholar from Normandale Community College
References
Ajayi, A. A., Soria, K. M., Dupont, R., & Varma, K. (2023). Advancing Equity and Opportunities for STEM Students From Low-Income Backgrounds: Evaluating the Impact of a Collaborative Support Program on Academic Outcomes. Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory & Practice, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/15210251231218268
Kumar, R.B. and Susteacek, M (2018) Impacts of the NSF STEM Scholars Program on Community College Student Success and Degree Completion, Journal of Microbiology & Biology/Volume 19, 3:16.”
McDonald, M. M., Zeigler-Hill, V., Vrabel, J. K., & Escobar, M. (2019). A single-item measure for assessing STEM Identity. Frontiers in Education, 4(78). https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2019.00078
Wai-Ling Packard, B., Successful STEM Mentoring Initiatives for Underrepresented Students 1st Edition.
Wang, X. (2020). On my own: The challenge and promise of building equitable STEM transfer pathways. Harvard Education Press.
Yosso, T. J. (2005). Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth. Race Ethnicity and Education, 8(1), 69–91. https://doi.org/10.1080/1361332052000341006
