BIAS UNDER THE MICROSCOPE: Over the next five years, underrepresented student enrollment in postsecondary education is projected to climb 25 percent. But will the biomedical sciences and STEM workforce experience the same demographic shift? The Coalition of Urban Serving Universities, the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities and the Association of American Medical Colleges hope so: the group published a report with recommendations for ways to increase underrepresented student enrollment in biomedical sciences and STEM graduate programs.
Increasing the percentage of graduate students who are black, Hispanic, female, low-income and disabled, “is essential to the future success of biomedical and STEM research,” the report says. It proposes actions for diversifying the field, including conducting more research on faculty and student recruitment practices, and testing unconscious bias training at universities.
