Maria Diaz-Ortiz - US grants

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2).

A strong and diversified next generation geoscience workforce will play a critical role in solving crucial global threats (water, energy, natural hazards, and food) under climate stresses in the coming decades. In the U.S., the geoscience workforce has the least ethnic diversity compared to other STEM fields (e.g., ~3% Hispanics). National Academies Press states that minority serving institutions are America's under-utilized resource for strengthening the STEM workforce for the near future. The University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV), as the nation’s second largest Hispanic serving institution (with ~32,000 students and ~90% Hispanic), and its location at the U.S.-Mexico border, make it an ideal hub for training the future Hispanic Geoscience workforce. The FUTURE project integrates the Hispanic culture into an informal Geoscience and STEM learning pathway through a family-centered model to address the challenge of enhancing Hispanic participation in STEM. A family-centered learning framework will help families understand one of the most critical elements in their lives – “water supply/resources” and its relationship to the geoscience/Earth environment. With the experience gained in a previous GEOPATHS project, the project team aims to expand and scale up the established platform and infrastructure of its existing program transforming the traditional Geoscience Learning Ecosystems (GLEs) while nurturing the Hispanic Geoscience workforce in a way that can be expanded to other minority serving institutions.

The FUTURE project will explore how the family can be placed at the center of informal STEM learning and be the basis for understanding a geoscience issue – how water “works;” i.e., the water cycle with humans at the center, and the activities/link to Earth environment (i.e., mining and agriculture in Texas). The FUTURE project has four objectives: (1) Establish an Informal Learning Network with a water and Earth-Environmental Science theme at communities; (2) Change Hispanic families' (parents and children) perspectives towards geosciences careers; (3) Recruit students into geoscience through a developed network and (4) Provide a channel into geoscience education and career paths for local junior/senior high school and 2-year college students. The project offers activities focused on water, soil, rocks and minerals, geoscience and their relationship to Rio Grande Valley’s history and economics (oil/gas mining and agriculture). FUTURE’s innovative approach will test how Informal Learning Networks between the local community and educational institutions can transform GLE for individuals from groups that have historically been underrepresented in STEM.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.