The program seeks: 1) to increase the number of low-income academically talented students with demonstrated financial need obtaining degrees in STEM and entering the workforce or graduate programs in STEM; 2) to improve the education of future scientists, engineers, and technicians, with a focus on academically talented low-income students; and 3) to generate knowledge to advance understanding of how factors or evidence-based curricular and co-curricular activities affect the success, retention, transfer, academic/career pathways, and graduation in STEM of low-income students.
The STEM disciplines supported by the S-STEM program include:
Biological sciences (except medicine and other clinical fields);
Physical sciences (including physics, chemistry, astronomy, and materials science);
Mathematical sciences;
Computer and information sciences;
Geosciences;
Engineering; and
Technology areas associated with the preceding disciplines (for example, biotechnology, chemical technology, engineering technology, information technology, etc.)
The program supports three types of projects. Awards for Track 1 (Institutional Capacity Building) projects may not exceed $650,000. Awards for Track 2 (Design and Development: Single Institution) projects may not exceed $1.0 million. Awards for Track 3 (Design and Development: Multi-Institutional Consortia) projects may not exceed $5.0 million. In all cases, the totals are inclusive of direct and indirect costs.
Eligibility:
PI:
For Track 1 (Institutional Capacity Building) and Track 2 (Design and Development: Single Institution) projects, the Principal Investigator must be a faculty member currently teaching in one of the S-STEM disciplines listed above who can provide the leadership required to ensure the success of the project.
For Track 3 (Design and Development: Multi-Institutional Consortia) projects, the Principal Investigator must be a faculty member currently teaching in one of the S-STEM disciplines listed in Section IV.B. or an institutional, educational, or social science researcher who can provide the leadership required to ensure the success of the project.
Institution:
An institution that is part of a larger system is considered separate for proposal submission purposes if it is geographically separate from the other campus(es) and has its own chief academic officer.
An Institution may submit one proposal (either as a single institution or as subawardee or a member of a Collaborative Research project) from each constituent school or college that awards degrees in an eligible field.
For Track 3 (Design and Development: Multi-Institutional Consortia): a proposal whose Principal Investigator is an educational or social science researcher in a program other than STEM does not count against the limit on the number of proposals submitted by institutions from S-STEM disciplines.
Penn State Downselect Requirements:
Project Description (5 pages maximum) of the proposed project that consists of:
Overview:
A brief description of the S-STEM project including the number of scholarships to be provided,
the discipline areas to be served by the scholarship funds,
the objectives of the project,
the expected retention or transfer and graduation rates, and
basic information about the student recruitment, selection, support, and career placement services to be provided as part of this S-STEM project.
A statement on Intellectual Merit.
A statement on Broader Impacts.
Prior related NSF Funding (2 pages maximum) summary:
Describe any related prior NSF funding of the PI/coPIs.
Project Management Plan (1 page) summary:
Provide a management plan in which the key personnel and project logistics are defined.
CVs:
Provide CVs of the PI/coPIs.