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NACME celebrates thirty-five years
“Our vision is an engineering workforce that looks like America.”
– Irving Pressley McPhail, NACME president & CEO
By Sue Marquette Poremba
Contributing Editor
 In September 2009, the National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering, Inc (NACME) celebrated its thirty-fifth anniversary.
For those thirty-five years, says president and CEO Irving Pressley McPhail, PhD, NACME has stayed true to its mission: to provide leadership and support for the national effort to increase the representation of successful African American, Native American and Latino women and men in engineering and technology, math and science careers.
“Our vision is an engineering workforce that looks like America,” says McPhail.
“There are a number of alarming conditions that NACME is attempting to resolve,” he says, “including a decline in our competitiveness in the global marketplace, the low performance of middle and high school students in math and science compared to peers in other developed countries, the shortage of native-born computer scientists and engineers, a reduction in R&D spending, and a growing pattern of outsourcing.”
NACME establishes academies of engineering
McPhail believes that the solution is to activate the hidden workforce of young men and women who have traditionally been underrepresented in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) careers.
Two signature initiatives are currently under way to reach out to young people as they begin to form an interest in STEM subjects. The Academy of Engineering (AOE) initiative is a partnership of NACME, the National Academy Foundation and Project Lead the Way. An AOE is a small learning community focused on engineering education and awareness, explains McPhail.
The partnership’s objective is to open 110 AOEs across the nation by September 2012. Large, mostly urban, high schools with high populations of underrepresented minorities are the targets. The first thirteen AOEs opened in 2008; twenty-nine are now operating. NACME enlists its corporate supporters to sit on local AOE boards, McPhail notes.
AT&T, one of NACME’s board companies, is supporting six academies in cities where AT&T has a major presence. Recently, McPhail and AT&T representatives visited the AOE at Sam Houston High School in San Antonio, TX. Sam Houston’s students are 55 percent African American and 42 percent Latino.
“The school has completed its year of planning and is beginning to implement the full Academy of Engineering design,” says McPhail. “The highlight of the visit was the opportunity to interact with students who will be our future engineers and scientists, and with faculty who are fully engaged in preparing their students for the rigors of STEM study.”
NACME partners with urban schools
The second initiative was established in partnership with Project Lead the Way. The Milwaukee public school system is the pilot site for this urban program, which provides engineering awareness materials for middle and high school students and their parents.
The Urban Initiative will create a support network to give young African American, Latino and Native American students a path to engineering education and careers. The program includes activities to encourage STEM teacher innovation, rewards for academic achievement and scholarships.
NACME awards scholarships
NACME is best known as a scholarship organization. Since 1974, it has provided more than $114 million in scholarships and support. Last year alone, 1,327 NACME scholars received more than $3.6 million in scholarship money from the organization and its fifty partner universities.
For the past six years, McPhail says, approximately 30 percent of all African American, Native American, and Latino engineering graduates in the nation received their bachelors degrees from one of NACME’s fifty partner universities. “These universities continue to develop best practices in recruiting, enrolling, educating, retaining and graduating underrepresented minorities in engineering,” he notes.
University partnerships are formed through an application process, with awards given on a five-year cycle. At the end of the cycle, the schools are given the opportunity to renew the partnership.
“We expect the universities to graduate 80 percent of NACME scholars in a five-year period,” says McPhail. The percentage increases to 90 percent for community college transfers.
Tracking performance
“We are extremely proud of the academic track records of our NACME scholars,” McPhail says. Historically, 83 percent of NACME scholars are either enrolled in grad school or have graduated with a bachelors degree in engineering five years after starting college. Students consistently maintain a 3.3 grade point average on a 4.0 scale.
NACME also keeps tabs on the performance of non-NACME minority students and majority students at its partner schools. “We believe a rising tide does, indeed, lift all boats,” says McPhail. “Efforts to provide a good learning environment for minority students will help majority students as well.”
NACME helps students find the best engineering programs available. “We are the authors of an authoritative guide for parents and students, with information on admission requirements, scholarship opportunities, and demographic factors at the nation’s ABET-accredited engineering colleges,” McPhail reports.
Community colleges are taken seriously
Every year NACME puts aside a significant amount of scholarship money to support students who graduate from community colleges and then move on to a NACME partner university. “We recognize that not every student is ready for a four-year college experience straight out of high school,” says McPhail.
Pipeline partnerships have been established with community colleges across the country. Students receive scholarship support to take advanced math and engineering courses at local community colleges when those courses aren’t available in the local school district.
Last year, McPhail led a national workshop that focused on helping community college math, engineering and science faculty develop a curriculum that connects math classes with engineering concepts. This is meant to encourage students in basic math to explore engineering and to let them know, as McPhail says, “You can get there from here.”
NACME relies on corporate partners
NACME’s board of directors includes representatives of some of the largest and most prestigious corporations in the world: Marathon Oil, 3M, AT&T, BAE Systems, BP America, Dow Chemical, Exxon Mobil, General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and more. These corporations contribute a large portion of NACME’s budget, and give NACME access to the advice and guidance of high-level corporate officers.
NACME influences national STEM policy
NACME is currently completing work on a new strategic plan, Connectivity 2013. The plan calls for more involvement at the national level in setting the agenda for research and policy in STEM. “NACME wants a seat at the table where discussions and decisions about diversity and equity in STEM education and the workplace are made,” says McPhail.
D/C
Sue Marquette Poremba is an engineering and construction writer in State College, PA.
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