The Impact of Undergraduate Research and Student Characteristics on Student Success Metrics at an Urban, Minority Serving, Commuter, Public Institution

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Sheila I Barron
Pamela Brown
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3610-8665
Tammie Cumming
Michelle Mengeling

Abstract

Challenges to establishing and maintaining undergraduate research programs include how to demonstrate impact as evidence for future funding, establish eligibility criteria when resources are limited, and assess new components. To address, undergraduate researcher GPA, credit accumulation and time to graduation were evaluated longitudinally, at an urban, public, minority and Hispanic serving, commuter college.  Students who participated in undergraduate research and matched peers were also compared.  Evaluation revealed that all groups benefited from participation in undergraduate research, whether they had full or part-time status, were STEM or non-STEM majors, or participated in single or multiple semesters of research. Addition of mandatory workshops after the fourth year of the seven years of students evaluated, correlated with longer participation in voluntary undergraduate research. Longer participation correlated with higher GPAs. Students who began research with no GPA, indicating that they were first-time freshmen or transfer students, were more likely to have low GPAs during the semester of participation, suggesting that a successful semester at the college before eligibility may be an evidence-based criteria to implement.

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How to Cite
Barron, S. I., Brown, P., Cumming, T., & Mengeling, M. (2020). The Impact of Undergraduate Research and Student Characteristics on Student Success Metrics at an Urban, Minority Serving, Commuter, Public Institution. Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 20(1). https://doi.org/10.14434/josotl.v20i1.25423
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Articles
Author Biography

Pamela Brown, New York City College of Technology, CUNY

Pamela Brown, PhD, PE is the Associate Provost at New York City College of Technology of the City University of New York, a position she has hald since 2012. Prior to that she served for a year as a Program Director for the National Science in the Division of Undergraduate Education. She was Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences from 2005 through 2011. A chemical engineer by training, she was a faculty member in the Chemistry Department from 1998 to 2005.