The LEAD Center's evaluation of the Spend a Summer with a Scientist (SaS) program at Rice University established the effectiveness of this research and professional development program with respect to the recruitment of minority undergraduates into graduate school and the retention of minority graduate students at Rice University.
Tracking of student academic outcomes, and interviews and surveys with student participants demonstrated not only that SaS participants are enrolling in graduate school and obtaining graduate degrees at an unusually high rate, but also that most of these participants feel the program had a powerful impact on their decisions about and success in pursuing advanced degrees. A number of them asserted that they would not have completed their degrees--or thought to enroll in graduate school at all--had it not been for their participation in the Spend a Summer with a Scientist program.
For undergraduate participants who have since graduated, 63 percent enrolled in graduate school, while 33 percent gained employment in mathematics, computational science, or engineering. For graduate student participants, the rate of retention so far is 97 percent, with just one student having left graduate school without a degree. A total of 57 percent of these participants are still in graduate school making steady progress toward their degrees, and of those who have already graduated with advanced degrees, two-thirds have received Ph.D.'s.