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Broadening Student Research Experiences Through a Summer Exchange Program across Campuses

Abstract Maryland Space Grant Consortium (MDSGC) was one of the awardees of the NASA Minority Serving Institution Partnership Development program of 2009 – 2010. Facilitated by MDSGC leadership at Johns Hopkins University (JHU) and active support from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, faculty and undergraduate students at three member institutions of MDSGC have partnered to implement a one year collaborative action plan to promote experiential learning and research efforts consistent with NASA’s strategic enterprises in space and earth sciences through this venture. Two of the participating institutions, University of Maryland Eastern Shore (UMES) and Morgan State University (MSU) are Historically Black Institutions (HBI) and the third, University of Maryland College Park (UMCP), serves a large number of minority students. A major component of the partnership effort has been focused on a novel student exchange program among the three campuses. Three undergraduate engineering students were selected from each of the participating campuses to spend eight weeks of summer under the supervision of faculty advisors with active NASA related research projects at one of the other campuses. At the end of the eight weeks, each student presented their work to NASA personnel and faculty members from MDSGC affiliate institutions and other invited guests at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) at Greenbelt. Active involvement of MDSGC leadership at JHU, faculty at UMES, MSU and UMCP, and personnel of the Education Division of GSFC helped students. In this paper, we will highlight the novelty and learning outcomes of the student exchange program, as well as the experiential learning and research endeavors that the students participated in during the course of this program.

1.0 Introduction Benefits of experiential learning and research in undergraduate engineering [1-3] and science [4,5] education are well documented. While fundamental concepts acquired in classroom settings can be enhanced through project work integrated within engineering courses and the culminating capstone design experience, involvement in intensive summer research internships, co-ops and exchange programs provides intellectual challenges, problem solving opportunities, and avenues to showcase innate creativity of the students in a setting that addresses broader dimensions of learning and discovery [6-8]. Recent emphasis on sensitizing students to realities of globalization has resulted in a significant increase in international exchange programs [9]. Evaluation and outcome assessment of these programs indicate that project and research experiences in an unfamiliar setting not only advance academic outcomes but afford lasting influences that

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Nagchaudhuri, A., & Teays, T., & Bowden, M., & Chen, G., & Henry, R. (2010, June), Broadening Student Research Experiences Through Summer Exchange Program Across Campuses Paper presented at 2010 Annual Conference & Exposition, Louisville, Kentucky. 10.18260/1-2--16708