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This proposal requests support for five (5) Scholars to enroll beginning Fall 2006 at Penn State. The target disciplines for scholars will be Food Science. The goal is to bring under-represented students into food Science as a cohort of five. The MSP program (as outlined in the proposal) will provide an array of supports and services to the scholars to ensure they graduate within 5 years. Through a strong, peer and faculty mentoring system each student will the opportunity to participate in research, and internships to strengthen and broaden their career choices such as graduate and professional schools, careers in govenment, industry and academics.
NON-TECHNICAL SUMMARY: Food Scientist are needed to research issues and concerns related to safe and viable food supply for the nation and world. This project will recruit, train and graduate a cohort of underrepresented food scientist to assist in solving homeland security issues related to food safety. The success of the MSP participants will help recruit other young underrepresented potential food scientists.
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APPROACH: Step 1 Work with Enrollment Management to yeild a prospect pool. Work with families and high school officials to yeild competitive MSP scholars. Step 2. Share with student their Award status and expectation, interview students, enroll them in first year semeinar along with expected courses for first year students. Monitor classes and extracurricula activities of each scholar. Step 3. After first year, work with students to meet requirement of their program and engage each scholar in research pojects, internships and other activites to enhance their undergraduate experiences. Innovative aspectes of the program includes: 1) Inter-generational Multicultural Mentoring: The composition of the various research team members, the scholars will greatly benefit from intergenerational mentoring from professors, post-docs, graduate students, and undergraduates students. In addition, because the department has such a mix of world class scientist, students will gain the opportunities to hear scientist in various cultures, and ethnic groups. 2) Washington D.C. Internships: Each fall, we afford our undergraduates the opportunity to participate in a USDA and/or EPA internships in Washington. The students work regular hours for four days a week at a pre-determine USDA or EPA location. One day per week, Penn State send faculty to teach classes so the scholar will lose no class time. This real world experience will give the scholar an opportunity to participate in real world problem solving. This program has proven to be a extraordinary success. 3) Role of MANRA with FFA Service Learning: Minorities in Agriculture and Natural Resources will play a very important role in recruitment, retention and professional development of the multicultural scholars. Annually MANRA and FFA will implement a service learning project related to food science. These collaborative experiences will provide opportunities for students to plan, organize and implement programs as part of a multicultural teams. 4) Internationalizing the Curriculum: When appropriate, the Assistant to the Dean will aid the students in obtaining passports and other documents needed for international travel. The Department of Food Science will encourage the scholars to internationalize their curriculum.