The AGEP Engineering Alliance: A Model to Advance Historically URM Postdoctoral Scholars and Early-Career Faculty in Engineering

Funding

Valerie Martin Conley is dean of the College of Education and professor of Leadership, Research, and Foundations at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs. She previously served as director of the Center for Higher Education, professor, and department chair at Ohio University. She was the PI for the NSF funded research project: Academic Career Success in Science and Engineering-Related Fields for Female Faculty at Public Two-Year Institutions. She is co-author of The Faculty Factor: Reassessing the American Academy in a Turbulent Era. This research is sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP; award numbers: 1821298, 1821019, 1821052, and 1821008). Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations are those of only the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF. Comas Lamar Haynes is a Principal Research Engineer / faculty member of the Georgia Tech Research Institute and Joint Faculty Appointee at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. His research includes modeling steady state and transient behavior of advanced energy systems, inclusive of their thermal management, and the characterization and optimization of novel cycles. He has advised graduate and undergraduate research assistants and has received multi-agency funding for energy systems analysis and development. Sponsor examples include the National Science Foundation, Department of Energy and NASA. Dr. Haynes also develops fuel cells and alternative energy systems curricula for public and college courses and experimental laboratories. Additionally, he is the co-developer of the outreach initiative, Educators Leading Energy Conservation and Training Researchers of Diverse Ethnicities (ELECTRoDE). He received his Bachelor of Science degree from Florida A&M University and his graduate degrees (culminating in a Ph.D.) from Georgia Tech; and all of the degrees are in the discipline of Mechanical Engineering. The AGEP Engineering Alliance brings together Georgia Institute of Technology, Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University, William Marsh Rice University, and the University of Colorado Colorado Springs to develop, implement, study, evaluate, and disseminate a model focused on the career development of historically underrepresented minority (URM) engineering postdoctoral scholars who eventually successfully transition into tenure-track faculty positions. Funding for this Alliance was procured from The National Science Foundation (NSF) Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (AGEP) program (award numbers: 1821298, 1821019, 1821052, and 1821008). Presently, approximately 10% of postdoctoral scholars (Yadav et al., 2020) and 6% of engineering professors (Roy, 2019) identify as racial/ethnic minorities, and this disproportionality will continue until URMs are more effectively engaged and embraced in the discipline (NSF, 2018).