Conference: Cultivating Geoscience Careers Pathways at HBCUs and Women-Only Colleges in South Carolina and Georgia

South Carolina State University (SCSU), in collaboration with over seventeen other academic institutions in South Carolina and Geogia, will organize a 1.5 days-long conference in Savannah, GA that will bring together a diverse constellation of academic, public, and private sector representatives to build leadership, enhance partnerships, and improve the capacity of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), and women-only colleges in South Carolina and Georgia to diversify, strengthen, and expand a rapidly evolving geoscience workforce. Outcomes of the conference will include a report outlining gaps, challenges, and opportunities linked to preparing students at participating institutions for diverse geoscience career pathways. The report will include recommendations for academia, public, and private sectors to address those gaps, challenges, and opportunities. This project will launch the foundation for a community of practice that continues to learn and share good practices and ideas, beyond the award period. The conference organizers will bring together faculty and administrators from HBCUs and women-only institutions in SC and GA, funding-agency representatives, and employers in private and public sectors. The goal of the conference is to 1) identify curriculum gaps and challenges linked to lack of preparation for students for geoscience jobs, 2) develop recommendations for participating institutions, employers and funding agencies to address the gaps and challenges, and 3) lay the groundwork for future collaborations. This project is jointly funded by Directorate of Geosciences' Division of Ocean Sciences (OCE) and the Division of Research, Innovations, Synergies and Education (RISE), and the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR). 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.