Dive Brief:
- The College of San Mateo, a community college located in California’s Bay Area, hopes to improve the success and retention rate of students enrolled in STEM subjects at the college through a coaching initiative which helps students not only fill in knowledge gaps, but navigate the administrative processes associated with a college education.
- Through a grant targeting STEM education at Hispanic Serving Institutions and under the leadership of program director José Rocha, METaS aims to offer students tutoring, coaching and other services to help Latino and low-income STEM students reach their full potential in their respective fields.
- In addition to the Math/Science Jam, as well as other tutoring and coaching opportunities, METaS offers students fields trips to other universities and businesses requiring STEM skills, support for transfers to new schools and counseling, according to the program’s website.
Dive Insight:
“We are offering tutoring and supplemental instruction,” says program director José Rocha, describing METaS Math/Science jam, a week-long preparer course students can take prior to the start of classes. “You just brush up on your skills. Some are using it to move forward on their courses, and others are using it as a refresher because they haven’t taken a math class for a while.”
Initiatives like these are trying to repair substantial diversity gaps in STEM education and workforce populations; according to a 2015 report from U.S. News and World Report, the STEM workforce was no more diverse than 14 years prior, with African-American and Latino workers making up 29% of the workforce population, but “just 16 percent of the advanced manufacturing workforce, 15 percent of the computing workforce and 12 percent of the engineering workforce – all rates that have remained essentially flat" from 2000.
To combat these trends, the college is offering one-on-one coaching services to 150 students over three years in order to help them better navigate academic and administrative issues. The services coaches offer can range depending on the needs of the students, and can include discussions about time management and financial aid form assistance, with coaches reaching out to students by e-mail, phone or texting. Rocha said the coaches work more like mentors and particularly help first-generation college students ask the right questions.
“A lot of these students are first-generation students,” Rocha said. Remembering his own college experience as a first-generation learner, he continued, “I didn’t know how to ask certain questions or how to navigate the system. The coaching, it actually provides that support for them.”
Rocha said he has spoken to several students who saw it as a strong opportunity, and he is excited to see what the results of the program will be in six months. Additionally, he said, it is important for the coaches to be proactive and responsive to the way in which students wanted to communicate.
“A lot of it has to do with the relationships that you build,” he said.