A grant recently awarded to Syracuse University and California State University, Fullerton aims to promote greater student diversity in the study of gravitational-wave astronomy.

The five-year, $937,000 grant, “Catching a New Wave: The CSUF-Syracuse Partnership for Inclusion of Underrepresented Groups in Gravitational-Wave Astronomy,” is being funded through the National Science Foundation’s Partnerships in Astronomy and Astrophysics Research and Education program. The grant was awarded earlier this summer.

Although data detailing the proportions between different races and genders studying and researching gravitational-wave astronomy is difficult to come by, in a 2010 data brief published by the NSF, white men dominated the scientist and engineering workforce. White men held 51 percent of all occupations. In comparison, black women contributed 2 percent, with Hispanic men at 4 percent.

“We really don’t want to operate in a monoculture,” said Joshua Smith, associate professor of physics at CSUF, referring to a lack of diversity in astronomy and astrophysics.

Duncan Brown, SU’s Charles Brightman Professor of Physics, agreed with his colleague, saying the promotion of diversity is important due to a “vast untapped potential” of perspectives and ideas from commonly underrepresented students.

CSUF, located on the outskirts of Los Angeles in Southern California, has had a longstanding relationship with the SU physics department.

Brown said he and Smith have been running an informal program between the two colleges for about five years, helping underrepresented students from CSUF pursue Ph.D.s at SU.

“(The grant) will take the informal program to the next level,” Brown said.

Jocelyn Read, an assistant professor of physics at CSUF and the principal investigator for the grant, said in an email that “most of the money we’ve requested will go directly to student support.”

Read said the grant would provide funding for CSUF student fellowships at SU while also “paying undergraduate and master student researchers at CSUF, and providing stipends for the community college student summer program.” Brown added that these fellowships would be three years long each.

Community colleges in the Los Angeles area, including Citrus and Cypress community colleges, frequently see students transfer over to CSUF or participate in summer research programs.

“Our fundamental goal is to include students from underrepresented groups in our research community and support them through to achieving a Ph.D.,” Read said. “We think we are especially well-positioned to help Hispanic and Latino/a students in particular, since CSUF and Citrus College are Hispanic-serving institutions. So we’re trying to pay attention to including those students as we recruit into our program, but we don’t require participants to identify as Hispanic or Latino/a.”

Brown and Smith said any underrepresented group in astrophysics and astronomy, including black people and women, can benefit from the grant as well.

Issues ranging from a lack of role models, explicit and implicit racism, systemic racism and financial constraint all play a part in a complex range of deterrents for underrepresented students, Brown said.

“All of this helps science,” Brown said, though, referring to the grant and efforts to promote diversity.

Published on September 6, 2016 at 9:16 pm

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