UNM, CNM Sign Articles of Agreement to Facilitate STEM Pathway

The Uni­ver­sity of New Mex­ico and the Cen­tral New Mex­ico Com­mu­nity Col­lege signed three coop­er­a­tive agree­ments in a cer­e­mony in the Green­house at UNM’s Castet­ter Hall in the Depart­ment of Biol­ogy Tues­day. The agree­ments, a Biol­ogy Trans­fer Degree Agree­ment, a Data Ana­lyst Agree­ment and an Artic­u­la­tion Ana­lyst Agree­ment, are all part of the UNM/CNM STEM Under­grad­u­ate Path­way (STEM UP) project and sig­nify an impor­tant col­lab­o­ra­tion between the two insti­tu­tions for­mal­iz­ing their com­mit­ment to increas­ing the num­bers of His­panic stu­dents from low-income back­grounds enrolled in and grad­u­at­ing with STEM degrees.

“The sign­ing cer­e­mony marks an impor­tant recog­ni­tion of the efforts that have been made to help stu­dents trans­fer to UNM from CNM, “says Car­olina Aguirre, direc­tor, UNM Title V STEM UP. “More impor­tantly it revi­tal­izes those efforts towards cre­at­ing clear path­ways and sup­port for stu­dents to earn both asso­ciates degrees at CNM and Bachelor’s degrees at UNM in the STEM fields,”

The Biol­ogy Trans­fer Degree Agree­ment pro­vides CNM stu­dents earn­ing an associate’s degree in biol­ogy with a clear path­way and admis­sion directly into the UNM Arts and Sci­ences Biol­ogy Depart­ment. The Data Ana­lyst Agree­ment will give stu­dents who declare in the STEM fields a quicker and more directed path­way between CNM and UNM.

“The agree­ment can help us help the stu­dents stay on track,” said Phillip Bus­tos, vice pres­i­dent for Stu­dent Ser­vices, TVI.

The Artic­u­la­tion Ana­lyst Agree­ment will ensure more com­pre­hen­sive data shar­ing through a data ana­lyst in the CNM research depart­ment ded­i­cated to gath­er­ing and report­ing data on STEM UP ini­tia­tives and progress towards meet­ing the grant goals of increas­ing STEM enroll­ment and grad­u­a­tion for His­panic and low income stu­dents at both institutions.

In Octo­ber 2011, UNM’s Office of Stu­dent Ser­vices and Cen­tral New Mex­ico Com­mu­nity Col­lege were awarded fund­ing under a Title V grant in the amount of $3.47 mil­lion grant by the U.S. Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion and autho­rized under Title III, Part F, sec­tion 371 of the Higher Edu­ca­tion Act of 1965 as amended, Hispanic-Serving insti­tu­tions (HSI) STEM and Artic­u­la­tion Pro­gram Cooperative.

The STEM UP project part­ners UNM with CNM to improve sys­temic path­ways and increase stu­dent trans­fers from two-year to four-year insti­tu­tions in STEM tech­ni­cal edu­ca­tion oppor­tu­ni­ties that ade­quately pre­pare His­panic and low-income stu­dents for STEM careers.

Media Con­tact: Dorene Dinaro, (505) 277‑5299; e-mail: ddinaro@unm.edu.