Gains in the Education of Mathematics and Science: A Summer Program Designed to Address Systemic Inequities and Barriers to STEM Pathways

Abstract

Educational inequity is widely prevalent in United States (U.S.) public schools and creates barriers to STEM education for underserved and underrepresented populations, including racial minority, low-income, and first-generation college students. Scientists at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR) recognized a need in its community, the greater Washington, DC metropolitan area, to improve access to high-quality STEM education, and founded the WRAIR Gains in the Education of Mathematics and Science (GEMS) program for this purpose. In pursuit of this goal, the GEMS program engages students using innovative learning strategies and authentic STEM experiences with the hopes of fostering interest in STEM and motivating more underserved and underrepresented students to persist in STEM education and career pathways. By 1995, WRAIR scientists began investigating how to bring science-enthusiastic but novice high school (HS) students into their laboratories where they could be