Dive Summary:
- Several universities are turning to community colleges in order to find potential graduates in STEM fields, with the University of Maryland Baltimore County, the City Colleges of Chicago and Illinois at Chicago, and Mount Holyoke College all recently announcing plans or partnerships with various foundations aimed at recruiting those particular students.
- Each program shares a common purpose of making a four-year degree more accessible for community college students in STEM fields, as well as alleviating the transfer problems those students may face, like courses that don't line up, non-transferable credits and larger class sizes.
- Bill LaCourse, dean of the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences at UMBC, says the idea is to establish a system including the university and the community colleges in order to make sure courses line up better and have uniformity in expectations, and he's also presenting ideas like giving STEM students more specific career information so they can develop a focus earlier on.
From the article:
The idea that the country needs more graduates in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields is not new, but several universities are now increasing their focus on finding those potential graduates, turning specifically to community colleges. ...