Have we reached the promised land of equal opportunity? An analysis of minority students' perceptions of two NSF-sponsored graduate education programs

The reality of increased global competition and the changing demographics of the country mandate an evaluation of how to best educate the minority students who will help sustain America's science and engineering workforce. Specialized programs have historically ensured that underrepresented students have access to equal opportunities in the existing educational system. Recent challenges to the existence of these types of programs make it valuable to analyze the perceptions of minority students who participate in specialized as well as mainstream programs to identify the most effective models to meet their educational needs. This study sought to ascertain those perceptions by surveying and interviewing minority and majority students who participate in two NSF-sponsored graduate education programs: the Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) Program and the Alliances for Graduate Education and The Professoriate (AGEP) Program.; A sequential mixed methods quasi-experimental research design (QUAN→qual) was used to test Outcalt and Skewes-Cox's theory of reciprocal engagement based on four variables: advising and/or mentoring, understanding of the doctoral program requirements, doctoral program outcomes, and sense of community. IGERT and AGEP students from 33 IGERT projects, and universities representing four AGEP Alliances participated in this study. The overall response rate was 50.5%.; Based on the study results, there is no difference in the levels at which the IGERT participants and AGEP participants had their educational needs met. However, differences did exist among IGERT majority students, IGERT minority students, and AGEP students with sense of community and understanding the educational purpose of the dissertation prospectus and the dissertation defense. The open-ended responses and the interviews illustrated that how students perceive their level of opportunity was not dependent on program group and/or racial classification; rather, it was dependent on the student's individual experience. Whereas the statistical results showed a lower sense of community within the academic program environment for the AGEP students, the interview results showed that students' participation in a specialized program alleviated that feeling. Reciprocal engagement is occurring based on equality of experiences among the doctoral students, but efforts need to continue to alleviate any gaps that may hinder equal opportunity for all students.