CREST Participates in the Science Research Mentoring Programs Conference at the American Museum of Natural History
Dr. Shakila Merchant, CUNY CREST The High School Initiative in Remote Sensing of the Earth Systems Science & Engineering (HIRES) Director and Deputy Director, CUNY CREST Institute participated in the Science Research Mentoring Programs Conference (SRMPCon) at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, NY from April 30-May 2, 2025. This first ever conference of the type brought together STEM leaders of high school science research mentoring programs from across the country with the aim to enable effective mentorship for youth in Science Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) research. Leaders from fifty (50) programs from sixteen (16) states participated in the conference.
The SRMPCon is geared towards the following aspects of youth research mentoring:
- Understanding the System: What are the different causes leading to our big shared challenges?
- Program Practices: What can individual programs do and what are they already doing to address these challenges?
- Joint Actions: What can we do together to make these program practices easier to implement or standardized? Small groups create new materials and plans.
- Broader Impact: Put the plans together to create broad-scale, systemic change across institutions.
This two and half days in-person conference guided by the above mentioned processes helped the participants understand the challenges, develop strategies, and create plans to implement together. It included several productive sessions such as workshop style presentations and alumni panels, activities and discussions, and joint action plans and strategies to implement. Dr. Merchant is a strong advocate of empowering youth through mentorship, actively engaged in the activities such as developing effective mentoring plans and actions, student-centered and inclusive curriculum.
The conference was a great platform for the different youth programs to share their vision and approach to youth mentoring as well as network. Commenting on her experience, Dr. Merchant said, “SRMPCon brought together Youth STEM leaders from Alaska to NY and it was a productive conference and each participant took home many ideas and thoughtful intentions and commitment to implement in our own programs.”
