Abstract
Underrepresented students (e.g. African American, Latino/a, and Native American) constitute about 15% of the undergraduate student population here on campus, consisting of over 4,000 students during any given year. Unfortunately, graduation rates of underrepresented students are consistently below the campus average. Therefore, innovative and effective strategies are needed in the classroom to improve academic performance and boost retention. Based on successful initiatives implemented in the Department of Chemistry, I propose to offer a series of monthly workshops that will help faculty identify the issues related to underrepresented groups in their classrooms, explore research-based programs and instructional strategies for improvement, and design an evaluation plan. By the end of the workshop series year, participants will have a concrete plan of action to implement, evaluate, and request the support they need to improve the learning experiences for underrepresented groups here on campus.

Project Objectives
The main objectives of this project are to:
1. Lead the campus in transferring the Campus Strategic Plan goals into undergraduate instruction(1):
• Re-envision and reshape the Illinois student experience.
• Embrace and enhance the diversity, as defined by the diversity values statement, of our campus.
• Enhance accessibility to undergraduate programs and increase diversity within these programs, especially academic courses.
• Support and augment teaching excellence in all modalities.
• Coordinate and systematize the many programs on campus that attract and support students from underrepresented groups.
• Leverage technology to provide the best possible learning experience for Illinois students.
2. Utilize campus resources in an innovative manner to achieve excellence in teaching and learning:
• Use university technology resources to enhance student learning and community building, particularly for underrepresented groups.
• Collaborate with campus resources to assist with course evaluation.
3. Adapt programs and instructional methods that have proven success in retaining underrepresented groups and improving academic performance, such as the Merit Program for Emerging Scholars, campus learning centers, cohort-building activities, online video resources, and scholarship programs.
4. Assist instructors campus wide with the following:
• Identify issues related to underrepresented groups such as decreased academic performance, retention, major recruitment, and financial concerns.
• Develop and implement a research-based plan of action to improve their teaching and courses that help underrepresented groups.
• Explore programs and funding to assist underrepresented groups within courses and departments.
• Create evaluation plans to assess teaching and program effectiveness, particularly for underrepresented groups.

Project Description
Introduction
Despite national focus on the importance of increasing the quantity and quality of the United States workforce, certain populations of undergraduate students continue to graduate with degrees at rates significantly below their peers. Campus wide, 4-year graduation rates among underrepresented students (African American, Latino/a, and Native American) are consistently below the average, approximately 52% versus 68%(2). A gap still exists at 5 and 6-year graduation rates as well (approximately 10%). Retention of these underrepresented groups is critical. Poodry states that diversity in the workforce matters. For example, “scientists, as individuals with their own points of view on what is important, make critical decisions for society on what should be studied and supported.(3)” This diversity is crucial to how our nation moves forward.
Underrepresented students constitute about 15% of the undergraduate student population here on campus. That is over 4,000 students during any given year. While many reasons exist for the gap in graduation rates, what we do as instructors in the classroom is critical to their retention, academic performance, and confidence(4). Drawing on my 15 years of teaching experience, programmatic management, and research, I seek to help other instructors and departments campus wide improve the retention, recruitment, and academic performance of underrepresented groups in their courses. Through a series of monthly workshops, I will help participants identify the issues related to underrepresented groups in their classrooms, explore and implement research-based programs and instructional strategies for improvement, and design an evaluation plan. Instructors will feel empowered to make changes in their classrooms and obtain support from their administration by the end of the project year. They will have a concrete plan of action to implement, evaluate, and request the support they need to improve the learning experiences for underrepresented groups.

Background: Past success with Underrepresented Groups
For the past 11 years, I have had the opportunity to teach, mentor, and advise hundreds of underrepresented students in our chemistry courses. As the Director of the Chemistry Merit Program, I work with over 450 participating students every semester. The Merit Program directly addresses the issue of graduating more students with STEM degrees, especially from underrepresented populations. The goal of this program is to recruit and retain students who are members of groups, such as minorities and women, who tend to be underrepresented in the areas of science, mathematics and engineering. The program also targets students from small high schools and students who have not yet declared a major. When I started the job in January of 2003, there were 80 students in the program. Now, there are over 450 total students participating annually. Since its inception in 1993, the Chemistry Merit Program has had a positive impact on students on both retention in STEM disciplines and grade performance in chemistry courses. For example, when freshmen students in Chemistry and Chemical Engineering were tracked over 12 incoming classes, those students that participated in Merit were retained at a higher rate versus those that did not participate, 52% versus 39%(5). The gap between retention rates was even larger for underrepresented minorities (+22% difference). Furthermore, of the Merit students we recruited into Chemistry or Chemical Engineering from some other major, half of them were Black or Hispanic. Another positive impact of the Merit Program is improved grade performance, particularly among underrepresented groups. It is important to point out that Merit students take the same exams and are graded on the same scale as all other students in the courses. In a comparison of GPAs for a given course, Merit students performed at a level nearly matching or exceeding all enrolled students. In all courses in which a Merit discussion section was offered, the Merit underrepresented minorities outperformed their non-Merit counterparts.
In addition to my role as Chemistry Merit Director, I have the privilege of teaching Chemistry 101 (Introductory Chemistry) and Chemistry 108 (The Chemistry of Everyday Phenomena) every year. I teach the largest percentage of minority students in our department’s courses, thus my successful teaching style is critical to retaining these underrepresented populations. Recognizing this responsibility, I have taken additional steps to try and understand my student population better. These steps have resulted in some of my instructional changes, with the end result that all students have benefit from them. Here are a few examples of what I discovered and the instructional changes I have taken to create a better learning experience:
• The ACT scores of my minority students are lower than their counterparts. This includes subcategories like Math, Science, and Reading scores.
o Instructional Change: I have created online videos that show the mathematical steps behind solving problems, so that struggling students can go over them at a slower pace, multiple times if needed. I have also eliminated many text hints in my online homework in favor of video hints so that students hear and see how chemistry is solved. The textbook is already rich in reading. The video hints supplement the textbook reading.
• Approximately 30% of my students are first-generation students.
o Instructional Change: I have implemented more mentoring into my course. I am more explicit with my students on how to study and be a successful college student. I make myself available for mentoring, in addition to chemistry help. Research also shows that peer mentoring is important(6). My lab and discussion sections are structured so that students work together in groups to solve problems and complete lab experiments. Furthermore, the online homework problems each have a flowing discussion board so that the students can help each other with the problems. This discussion board is heavily used and the students are very helpful to one another. In addition, several of my teaching assistants are undergraduate upperclassmen. Besides teaching the assistants how to facilitate lab and discussion, I train them on the important role they play as mentors to these students.
• Only 2% of my students are declared chemistry, chemical engineering, or biochemistry majors. I have a wide variety of majors in my courses, with the highest as undeclared (including my underrepresented students). As a result, many of my students are “afraid” of chemistry or don’t understand its relevance to their career(7).
o Instructional Change: I include more application-based examples in my lectures and problems. I attempt to establish a “personal” aspect to my examples that seems relevant to their lives, no matter what they are pursuing as a career .
Through understanding my student population better, I have implemented instructional changes that have benefitted all students, especially my minority students. I also strive to place my underrepresented students in corresponding Merit sections to improve academic performance and develop a community of scholars among them.
Through my research on academic success in STEM fields, I have also recently discovered the importance of student financial support and participation in undergraduate research(8,9). As a result, I have collaborated with colleagues to obtain grants that provide scholarships to financially needy students. I also work very hard to find undergraduate research opportunities for students, especially underrepresented groups. Early data is showing that this is boosting retention and academic performance among our underrepresented chemistry majors.

Proposed Project and Timeline
Addressing the issue of minority retention and academic performance can often feel overwhelming and time consuming for instructors. This is not a problem that can be solved quickly. It takes careful investigation, planning, and time. As a result, I propose a series of monthly workshops that will help a community of faculty identify the issues related to underrepresented groups in their classrooms, explore and implement research-based programs and instructional strategies for improvement, and design an evaluation plan. Recognizing that each discipline and course is unique, each workshop will be posed in a way that is meaningful to each instructor, yet addresses the general issue of minority retention at hand. Each workshop will last 1.5 hours, with the first 30 minutes for informal discussion and/or reporting back to the group about their monthly assignment. The final hour will focus on a topic to move the initiative forward. The workshops could take place over the lunch hour (11:30am-1:00pm) so that more teaching faculty can participate.

Workshop Calendar

An intensive workshop series such as this will empower teaching faculty and departments to directly address minority retention and academic performance in the classroom. This will significantly impact campus and directly address their Campus Strategic Plan goals. I believe the anticipated initiatives will positively impact underrepresented groups and enrich the learning experiences for all involved, both students and instructors.

Expected Outcomes and Dissemination
This project will create a group of enthusiastic instructors and administrators that are ready to implement instructional strategies and programs that directly impact underrepresented students. It is expected that academic performance will improve, retention will increase, and over time, graduation rates will increase as well. Evaluation of each initiative will be encouraged so that impact can be assessed and disseminated campus wide. I plan to partner with the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning to provide insights, share strategies, facilitate workshops and disseminate findings (such as the Faculty Workshop Series, Campus Faculty Retreat, and College Teaching Academies). Furthermore, to reach additional faculty, I will encourage this participating group to share their strategies by contributing to the CITL Teaching Topics. I will also look to include the Provost’s Office to assist with dissemination. For those instructional strategies and programs that are unique and innovative nationwide, I will encourage conference presentations and publications in academic journals.

Sources:
(1) http://strategicplan.illinois.edu/index.html
(2) http://www.dmi.illinois.edu/cp/
(3) Poodry, Clifton A. Minorities in the Chemical Workforce: Diversity Models that Work. Diversity: Why Is It Important and How Can It Be Achieved?; The National Academies Press: Washington, DC, 2003, p 7.
(4) Haak DC et al. Increased structure and active learning reduce the achievement gap in introductory biology. Science. 2011 Jun 3;332(6034):1213-6. doi: 10.1126/science.1204820.
(5) G.M. Adams and J.M. Lisy, “The Chemistry Merit Program: Reaching, Teaching, and Retaining Students in the Chemical Sciences”, Journal of Chemical Education, Vol. 84, pp 721-726, April 2007.
(6) Baez-Galib R et al. 2005, Cohen, 1994, Denofrio, Russell, Lopatto & Lu, 2007, Gosser & Roth, 1998.
(7) Hoch, Russel, Steffen, Weaver, & Burgess, 2009; Mehta, Clayton, & Sankar, 2007; Middlecamp, Jordan, Schacter, Lottridge, & Oates, 2006; Middlecamp, Phillips, Bentley, & Baldwin, 2006; Rudd, et al, 2001.
(8) Anderson E, Kim D. Increasing the success of minority students in science and technology. American Council on Education; Washington, DC: 2006.
(9) Barlow & Villarejo, 2005; Clewell BC, de Cohen CC, Tsui L & Deterding N, 2006; Gandara & Maxwell-Jolly, 1999; Good & Halpin, 2000;Jones et al., 2010; Russell SH, Hancock MP & McCullough J 2007.