Bronwen Konecky, assistant professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, and her collaborators won a grant from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Pilot Fund for a new DEI initiative, Undergraduate Research in the Geosciences for Under-Represented Groups (URG2). Through the new fund, the Packard Foundation aims to increase diversity in STEM by providing additional resources to support their fellows’ DEI efforts in their home departments and universities.
“In order to solve the problems facing the Earth, we need all hands on deck,” Konecky said. “Earth science has long struggled with diversity, yet it has the most diverse set of stakeholders.”
Through URG2, Konecky and seven other geoscientist fellows are collaborating to provide positive research experiences for historically underrepresented groups in the geosciences. They offer paid summer research opportunities to undergraduate students interested in using physics, chemistry, biology, math and data science to better understand the Earth. They also hope to encourage students without specific experience with geosciences to participate and develop skills and interests from existing strengths through mentorship.
Read more on the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences’ website.
