Mission
Our mission in the PROPEL (Promoting Research Opportunities for Equity in Learning) program is to ensure equitable access to academic and research opportunities for all undergraduate students at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. We plan to achieve this by:
- Engaging UMass faculty, postgraduate, and graduate students as mentors who are eager to guide motivated students.
- Providing resources to mentors on effective recruitment and mentorship strategies.
- Connecting students with mentors who appreciate enthusiasm, curiosity, and potential from diverse backgrounds.
- Guiding students to resources in developing successful applications and career goals.
- Providing a software platform for mentors to share project opportunities and a designated application period for students.
History
The UMass Biology Undergraduate Research Apprenticeship (BURA) program was started in 2009 by Biology Professor Prof. Sheila Patek, bringing positive experiences with UC Berkeley’s Undergraduate Research Apprenticeship Program and a passion for improving access to undergraduate research. Dr. Steven Brewer working with undergraduate student Muhammed Syed developed a Drupal framework to support the program. The interface was refined and the workflow was modified by Prof. Patek and her student Matt Seden. After Sheila Patek joined Duke University in 2013, Profs. Michele Markstein and Steve Brewer streamlined the workflow and maintained the (BURA) site that was used until 2020 with Prof. Markstein serving as the program director.
In 2021 we started working the the Open Source MUSER Drupal framework developed by Sheila Patek at Duke with Jay Beaton Consulting. We are grateful for the many years of hard work and thought Sheila Patek has put into this project and for her advice in moving forward with MUSER! We added several features to expand the scope of our program for the recruitment of teaching assistants, simplify the application process, add new searchable fields, enable pronoun usage, and collect data to evaluate the success of the program in creating equitable access to research and teaching opportunities. Special thanks to the Biology Racial Justice Committee (Andrew Spracklen, Elena Vazey and Madelaine Bartlett), Linda Zeigenbein, Director of Student Success and Diversity, Scott Auerbach, Executive Director of iCONS, and the Institute for Diversity Sciences for helpful suggestions. Thanks to Biology Department Heads Elsbeth Walker and Rolf Karlstrom for support and funding the new Biology Undergraduate Apprenticeship (BUA) program.
In 2024 the Biology Undergraduate Apprenticeship (BUA) program was expanded to serve all STEM disciplines through a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Inclusive Excellence Award to the University of Massachusetts Amherst (Thanks to Elizabeth Conner for making this happen). To reflect the broader mission the BUA program was renamed PROPEL (Promoting Research Opportunities for Equity in Learning).
A grant funded through the UMass Office of Faculty Development for 2024-2025 "A Bottom-Up Network for Developing Transparent Policies and Mechanisms for Equitable Access to STEM Undergraduate Research Experiences" will bring faculty from departments in the Colleges of Natural Sciences and Engineering are together to learn faculty experiences and traditions in different disciplines and from scholars nationwide. We will use these practices in our roles as mentors, teachers and more broadly in our communities to effectively mentor diverse undergraduate researchers.
