UTSA Educational Research Training Program: P-20 Pipeline Issues

The program will accept students already enrolled at UTSA as well as transfer students from Alamo Colleges, a local network of community colleges. Over the course of the 5-year grant, UTSA will offer up to 48 students one-year fellowships.

The interdisciplinary training program's P-20 theme focuses on research addressing inequities that exist in students' educational experiences, transitions and outcomes from preschool through graduate school. As part of the year-long training program, fellows will receive training in education research, conduct research with faculty mentors, and receive assistance in applying to doctoral study.

The training program includes a semester-long seminar on P-20 issues in the fall of each fellow's junior year, followed by a semester-long research apprenticeship with faculty mentors in the spring. During the summer, fellows will have the opportunity to participate in several summer research institutes, including a week-long Young Scientists Institute at UTSA led by staff from the Educational Testing Service (ETS) and a one-week workshop on dual language learners held at Stanford University. Each year, two fellows will also have the opportunity to participate in an eight-week Summer Undergraduate Research Experience at ETS' New Jersey headquarters in which fellows will engage in meaningful research under the mentorship of an ETS staff member.

For participation in the training program, each fellow will receive a stipend, housing and meals for the summer research institutes at UTSA and Stanford University, and support for GRE preparation. In addition, the fellowship includes the costs of travel to Stanford University and a small travel fund to attend a research conference.

The total projected costs of the training program are approximately $1.1 million. In addition to the IES grant, UTSA and ETS will be contributing approximately $140,000 combined to fund the summer training institutes (UTSA: $84,000; ETS: $56,449).

Increasing Diversity in the Education Sciences

A primary purpose of all Pathways training programs is to help increase diversity in the Education Sciences. UTSA is a Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI) that serves the South Texas geographic area. In addition to recruiting fellows from UTSA, the training program will recruit transfer students from St. Philip's College (a local historically black community college) and other community colleges within the Alamo Colleges district. Participating faculty from UTSA represent a variety of disciplines including sociology, education, psychology, demography, linguistics, reading, and biology.