Engaging Underrepresented Students in Geotechnical Careers in their Communities
Abstract
Mount San Antonio college is a large, single-campus community college (60,000+ total enrollment) in the Los Angeles area that primarily serves groups historically underrepresented in STEM. Through involvement with the NSF-supported SAGE program (Supporting and Advancing Geoscience Education at Two-Year Colleges) the authors identified a significant disparity in some demographic categories between the ratio of students enrolled at the campus and vs. those that either 1) declared as geoscience majors or 2) chose to enroll in further geoscience classes (i.e. Physical Geology) after completing Earth Science courses. Our department's multi-faceted approach to engaging students in the geosciences (field-based learning, research opportunities, etc.) revealed that many students, while interested in the geosciences, preferred to not transfer immediately after graduation, struggled with the supporting science, math and English requirements for transfer, or simply wished to enter the workforce as quickly as possible. Because of this, the authors have begun developing a "Geotechnician Certificate" program as part of the college's significant investment in CTE (Career and Technical Education) and received funding from California's Strong Workforce Initiative, a program to assist California's community colleges in developing CTE programs. We envision students obtaining the Geotechnical Certificate and increasing their chances of entry-level employment with firms specializing in water resources and quality, engineering geology, petroleum resources, environmental hazards and remediation, and local government agencies. Because a significant component of the program will be work experience with local firms, students from traditionally underrepresented and underserved groups will have opportunities for employment at firms and agencies that require geotechnical skills and are a part of their local communities. We will discuss the proposed course sequence for the Geotechnician Certificate and moving these geotech-specific courses through the curriculum process at the institution and state levels, challenges related to implementation and buy-in from stakeholders, and progress in creating a network of local employers for students who have completed the program.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2018
- Bibcode:
- 2018AGUFMED11A..09M
- Keywords:
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- 0810 Post-secondary education;
- EDUCATIONDE: 0850 Geoscience education research;
- EDUCATIONDE: 0855 Diversity;
- EDUCATIONDE: 6630 Workforce;
- PUBLIC ISSUES