Objectives
The specific objectives of the AGEP program are:
1. develop and implement innovative models for recruiting, mentoring, and retaining underrepresented minority students in doctoral programs
2. develop effective strategies for identifying and supporting underrepresented minorities who want to pursue academic careers
The AGEP program also supports a research effort to identify major factors that promote successful transition of minority students from:
1. undergraduate through graduate study
2. course-taking in the early years of the graduate experience to independent research required for completion of a dissertation
3. the academic environment to the workplace
To accomplish this objective, the research component will be informed by a portfolio of Federal and private sector efforts in this arena in order to identify factors underlying exemplary as well as unsuccessful efforts.

Goals
• to increase the participation of under-represented students in the STEM disciplines
• to increase the number of under-represented students achieving a Ph.D. in a STEM discipline
• to prepare STEM discipline Ph.D.s for careers in academia

UCSC Co-Investigator: Prof. Lisa Sloan, Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies
UCSC Program Director: Julio Cardona, Assistant Dean of Graduate Studies

Program home page: http://graddiv.ucsc.edu/student_affairs/agep.php

UC System wide AGEP Alliance: http://www.ucop.edu/acadadv/agep/

National Science Foundation AGEP: http://www.agep.us/