UMaine receives $300,000 NSF grant for project to promote STEM, media report
Mainebiz and WABI (Channel 5) reported the University of Maine is one of 37 institutions nationwide to receive first-ever awards for the National Science Foundation’s INCLUDES program, a comprehensive initiative to enhance U.S. leadership in science and engineering by broadening participation in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). UMaine will receive $300,000 for a two-year pilot project that builds on its successful Stormwater Management Research Team (SMART) program based in the College of Engineering that has created a diverse STEM pathway with community water research. The SMART program is a hands-on, project-based education initiative to engage high school girls and minority students in engineering and sciences. “Participation of these groups in STEM isn’t proportional to the numbers across Maine and the United States,” Mohamad Musavi, principal investigator on the project and associate dean at UMaine’s College of Engineering, told Mainebiz. He added that only about 18 percent of females in the nation and 15 percent of females in Maine participate in engineering. The pilot projects were selected for their potential to deliver prototypes for bold, new models that broaden participation in STEM, according to an NSF news release. Near the end of the two-year pilot project, UMaine will be eligible to become one of the five initiatives selected for up to $12.5 million each in funding. “This [INCLUDES grant] is the beginning of the road for us,” Musavi told Mainebiz. “They’ve given the opportunity for 37 institutions to prove their program is valuable to scale up nationally.” U.S. Sens. Susan Collins and Angus King also released a joint press release on the grant.