The Road to STEM Retention at MSU

By: Arsha Pinson

With the Fall 2018 semester now in session the Peer BEARS mentoring program made

sure to begin their first year with a positive start.

This grant funded program is Morgan’s first mentoring program to support STEM students,

standing for Peers Bringing Enrichment and Rearing Success.

Baltimore City Schools house about 80,000 students, about 55 percent come from low

income or single parent households.

Black students are 90 percent of that statistic, with 50 percent of the ninety having a learning

disability. Out of Morgan States 15,000 student half come from those statistics.

This causes an issue in terms of retention because those students are no ready to handle the

complexity of the work giving to them, so they begin to leave the STEM program.

STEM retention at most HBCU’s are around 30 percent, however at Morgan State it is

around 70 and continuously growing. “We wanted to create a culture and structure that helps to

optimize the talents of all students that come to SCMNS,” said Claton Lewis; the Director of the

mentoring program.

He continues to explain, that to retain students at a higher rate they must engage students

earlier. The engagement plans include pairing lower classmen with higher classmen to provide

them with a mentor, someone to navigate through their major and most importantly a friend.

Thus, creating a community that has the resources to allow students to be successful in STEM.

Peer BEARS began their program launch with a week full of activities aimed to bringing

students out and instantly engaged.

“The first week of events was a great success and a good starting point for our program,”

according to Kevin Antoine; the coordinator of the program.

Antoine planned a week full of fun from a Q & A mixer we're students could ask all the

questions they wanted to a Mentor Match day and ended with a Block Party.

“We went from not even having 10 mentors to 80 in literally a few days, and even had a huge

turn out from students. I’m truly excited to see how this program will flourish,” said Antoine.

Although the people behind the program have done their jobs, student involvement will also play

a huge role.

“I wish this program was something put in place my freshman year when I was on the verge of

switching my major, this program will help show under classmen the light at the end of the

tunnel,” said Nicole Steel; a senior computer science major.

Despite the hardship to finish the STEM program, there are still students who believe completing

the program made them who they are today.

“STEM is definitely a hard program to complete, and doing it alone is a personal reward that

makes you believe you can do anything. However, building a community insure more success

and more gradation numbers, so Peer BEARS will definitely be a great program,” explain Kevin

Little, a STEM alumnus.

With retention on the rise and this program put in place to help do so the next goal to reach

according to Danielle Ballard, a retention officer for the STEM program, is to “get more women

involved along with giving the women already involved more recognition.”