Increasing the retention rates of students in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) has become a national priority. Students who are the first in their families to attend college, under-represented minorities or those that transfer from community colleges to complete a four-year degree are particularly prone to leave the STEM fields. There remains a need to establish retention models that are adaptable and can serve a variety of students and institutions.  Faculty at Florida Atlantic University (FAU), University of Central Florida (UCF), and Western Carolina University (WCU) have created the LEARN Consortium, a three-institution initiative to directly address this national need, by sharing and expanding best practices in existing retention models, and developing and testing new models for STEM retention. Our model being evaluated and modified for STEM retention is called the Learning Environment and Academic Research Network (LEARNTM).  Initially developed at UCF for first-year students, we have modified this model to meet the unique needs of incoming upper-division AA transfer STEM students, while retaining the three central components of the model including Research, Mentoring, and Community building.  While both F-LEARN (freshmen) and T-LEARN (transfer) programs share strategies of involving students in undergraduate research early in their academic career, freshman and transfer student populations face different transitional challenges, therefore the two programs have been implemented in distinct ways.  In our presentation, we will describe both the F- LEARN and T-LEARN programs at the three institutions, share strategies and challenges for effective collaborations and implementation, introduce the T-LEARN model and outline the modifications made to F-LEARN, and provide preliminary data on the effectiveness of these models at impacting STEM retention and success.  <br/>

Impacting retention of STEM freshmen and transfer students through research communities within the LEARN Consortium

255th National Meeting (2018)

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