The Five Year Evolution of a MESA Program

The first MESA Center in Texas opened in 2007 and after five years there is a story to be told. MESA, which stands for Mathematics, Engineering, and Science Achievement, is a national program that originated in California in 1970. Its purpose is to support educationally disadvantaged students throughout the education pipeline to excel in math and science and go on to attain degrees in the fields of engineering, science and mathematics. In 2005 a grant program was funded by Hewlett-Packard to expand MESA from California to other states and our college presented a strong proposal. However, at that time the college was unable to provide a dedicated space for a Center in which students could congregate and we were not funded. Over the next two years we continued to pursue the required space, and after finally procuring an underutilized classroom we became one of the few community colleges invited to join MESA as a non-funded affiliate of the program. Since its inception in the spring of 2007, the MESA Program has made a substantial contribution to the success of our engineering program. Once our MESA Center was established, it soon became apparent why this space was a critical component of the MESA Program. It has served as a focal point for student study groups and a central location for promoting student scholarships, engineering design competitions, internships, and summer undergraduate research opportunities. The Center has been host to tutoring sessions for difficult courses, student success seminars, resume writing and job search workshops, as well as meetings of several science and engineering oriented student organizations on our campus. The Center has also served as a forum for presentations by faculty and student researchers, university recruiters, and practicing professionals from our area. This paper will present an analysis of our experience with the challenges encountered and the encouraging results of the first five years of the MESA Program at our community college, as well as offer recommendations and outline future plans.