Despite continued efforts to recruit and retain students from socio-economic groups underrepresented in ecology, the demographic composition of the field remains out of step with the overall US population. While evidence indicates that research mentoring programs in ecology at the undergraduate level increase retention of students from underrepresented minority (URM) groups, factors that develop long before college may limit the number of URM students who choose to study ecology in the first place. Accordingly, increasing representation of diverse socio-economic groups in ecology requires reaching URM students before they make decisions about college. However, many high school students have limited access to research mentoring in ecology, and programs based at field stations may fail to engage URM students, who overwhelmingly live in urban areas. To address this gap, we developed Project TRUE (Teens Researching Urban Ecology), a program that engages high school students in urban ecology by providing a place-based, hands-on research experience. To assess the effectiveness of Project TRUE in addressing factors that hinder URM high school students from pursuing majors in the area of ecology, pre- and post-participation questionnaires covering mentoring, research experiences, science interest, and career intentions were administered to three cohorts of students who participated in Project TRUE.
Results/Conclusions
Since 2015, three cohorts of high school students have taken part in Project TRUE and completed pre- and post-participation surveys (44, 47 and 48 students in 2015, 2016 and 2017, respectively). Immediately following the completion of Project TRUE, 78% (108 of 139) of respondents indicated a change in academic intentions as a result of participating in Project TRUE, and 47% (66 of 139) indicated that they intended to change their academic major to an ecology-related major. Project TRUE also had a strong influence on respondent perceptions of science and identity. For example, on a 7-point Likert Scale (1 = “not at all”, 7 = “a lot”), respondents reported a mean influence of 6.6 for the effect of Project TRUE on “understanding of what researchers in science and conservation jobs actually do” and 6.3 on “confidence in doing science”. Similarly, respondents reported a mean influence of 6.4 when asked if Project TRUE led to “better research skills” and 6.3 for “I have better science skills”. These preliminary findings suggest that Project TRUE’s use of an urban ecology research mentoring program for pre-college URM has a positive impact on participants’ career intentions, identity, and perceptions of science.