Project Grant 2325934

This Project Grant award, with a total funding amount of $105,435, was provided by the National Science Foundation (NSF) under the STEM Education (CFDA 47.076) program. The award will fund a collaborative research project between Central Michigan University and the University of Northern Colorado (UNC) titled "GP-UP: Short-Term Immersive Experience for Atmospheric Science Undergraduates for Retention and Community-Building."

The primary goal of the project is to address the critical issue of attrition among undergraduate students in atmospheric science and meteorology programs. To achieve this, the award will support a one-week immersive field experience called "Student Training for Observational Research in Meteorology (STORM)" for rising sophomore students. The program aims to build community, foster student-faculty rapport, and increase participants' sense of purpose and science identity through hands-on activities involving meteorological instrumentation and experiments. The project's impact will be evaluated through a mixed-methods approach, including pre- and post-experience surveys, interviews, and analysis of student retention and academic performance data. All research instruments and meteorological data collected will be made publicly available to support other undergraduate research experiences.