Abstract
Since 1999, the Kansas K-12 Initiative has generated almost $21 million from university, school district, private foundations, and federal sources to support the development of multiple STEM programs in Kansas City, Kansas. Program goals were to engage urban minority youth in STEM education, increase college readiness, and provide motivation for STEM careers. Over the 20-year period, these programs had 3,547 participants. Ninety percent of program graduates were racial and ethnic minorities. Almost all seniors (98% on average) enrolled in college, and 70% of students who declared a major, declared a STEM major. Programmatic findings demonstrate that STEM programming is widely supported, feasible, and effective on the measure of post-secondary education matriculation. This program description highlights the necessary evolution of programming over two decades with multiple funding sources, giving insight into sustained partnerships, commitment of staff, and long-term engagement of students.
Highlights
“Regrettably, far too many of our most able students are neither discovered nor developed, those who have not had adequate access to educational resources, have not been inspired to pursue STEM, or who have faced numerous other barriers to achievement.” (National Science Board, 2010, p5)
PROGRAM DESCRIPTION In this paper we focused on the foundational Kansas K-12
Saturday Science Academy had an average of 124 participants per year with a total of 2,374 participants over 20 years; Summer Science Residential Academy had an average of 31 participants per year; Wednesday Media Project had an average of 28 participants per year; Summer Enrichment Camp had an average of 26 participants per year; and Research Internship had an average of 11 participants per year
Summary
“Regrettably, far too many of our most able students are neither discovered nor developed, those who have not had adequate access to educational resources, have not been inspired to pursue STEM, or who have faced numerous other barriers to achievement.” (National Science Board, 2010, p5). The proportion of individuals from racial and ethnic minority groups in college-level STEM occupations, up from 9% in 2003 to 13% in 2017, remains below their share of the college-educated workforce (17%) (National Science Board, 2020). This is true for fields with high-earning potential, including physicians and surgeons (11%), pharmacists (10%), dentists (9%), physical therapists (9%), and optometrists (5%) (National Science Board, 2020). In 1999, community members and leaders in the Kansas City Kansas Public School District noticed a lack of student interest and entry into STEM careers These leaders, together with the University of Kansas Medical Center’s (KUMC) Office of Diversity and Inclusion partnered to create the Kansas K-12 Initiative. Our objective was to describe the development and evolution of a 20-year old pipeline program that continuously aims to expose underserved youth to STEM careers, highlighting the programming, multi-sector investment, impact, and evaluation changes over time
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