Identifying Assets and Collaborative Activities to Support Student Success in Environmental Data Science at Minority Serving Institutions

This report synthesizes the findings and recommendations from a project funded by the National Science Foundation (Award #2135830): Identifying Assets and Collaborative Activities to Support Student Success in Environmental Data Science at Minority Serving Institutions. The project brought together current and former faculty from Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs) and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) to discuss opportunities to empower and support equitable data science education across these institutions and co-create solutions that ameliorate the digital divide. Our collective vision is to ensure all students have the resources and skills required to be effective in applying data science throughout their careers, ensuring their competitiveness in the workplace where they will be active participants in using their knowledge and skills to influence policies and decisions that may directly impact their communities. 

We focused specifically on the application of these skills to the environmental sciences, as there has been significant growth in large ecological datasets and environmental synthesis projects over the last decade. We aimed to co-create actionable recommendations for undergraduate environmental data science education at TCUs and HBCUs. This report represents the culmination of our project work, summarizing our activities and synthesizing the discussions we had among ourselves, our working group members, and the broader community. Our project goals were: 

1. to identify the unique assets that these institutions bring to environmental data science education and the barriers to adoption of data science in teaching relevant courses; 

2. to identify and raise awareness of the resources and other assets available through existing organizations that support equitable data science education;

3. to promote relationship-building among faculty and EDSIN partner organizations, forming the basis of a network for future community-informed resource sharing and co-creation of culturally-specific curricula with peer support; and 

4. to co-develop this recommendations report for the enhancement of student success in environmental data science at these institutions.