EAGER: Collaborative Research: Enhancing Impact of Broadening Participation in Computing Efforts through the STARS Cohort Conference Attendance Program

Temple University, in collaboration with North Carolina State University, will use their team's experience with the Students and Technology in Academics, Research, and Service (STARS) Computing Alliance to create a new activity - the STARS Cohort Conference Attendance Program. The effort will develop, test, and evaluate a model that faculty can use to support cohorts of students attending computer science (CS) conferences. The STARS cohort model has been shown to increase students' sense of belonging, identity as computing professionals, engagement, and academic outcomes, with disproportionately positive benefits for students from underrepresented groups in computing. This project will extend that model, engaging and training members of the Computer and Information Sciences and Engineering (CISE) Directorate's Principal Investigators (PIs) in building community among students attending conferences. The STARS Cohort Conference Attendance Program will support the development of the model, a pilot workshop to disseminate that model, provide scholarships for 20 PIs to attend a STARS Cohorts training workshop, supply 100 scholarships for undergraduate, graduate students, and faculty (particularly those from Minority Serving Institutions) to attend either the Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing or the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing in 5-person cohorts. Thus, the STARS Cohort program will provide a low barrier to entry for new PIs wishing to engage in meaningful BPC efforts, in the hopes that the experience will serve as a hook to engage the new-to-BPC PIs in post-conference BPC cohort activities at their home institutions. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.