Student competitions are an engaging way to foster hands-on learning, critical thinking, and collaborative skills in STEM education. These events provide participants with opportunities to apply their knowledge in real-world scenarios, connect with industry professionals, and build their portfolios. Within the ATE community, competitions like the  Community College Innovation Challenge (CCIC) and the MATE ROV Competition exemplify how innovation and teamwork can lead to creative approaches and solutions. Whether tackling challenges, exploring innovative designs, or solving complex problems, these competitions showcase the benefits of experiential learning.

In this From the Archive blog post, we share three resources highlighting how ATE engages with student competitions. First, a detailed guide offers a roadmap for preparing students to compete in the Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition. Next, a report provides an inside look at a drone business plan competition, which combines entrepreneurship and technology to engage underrepresented students in the growing drone industry. Finally, we share a video that explores strategies for developing and hosting cybersecurity competitions for those interested in organizing their own. Together, these resources provide inspiration and practical advice for educators and participants alike.

Two years ago Steven Dotts thought he was too busy to become involved in the Estrella Mountain Community College’s remotely operated vehicle (ROV) team as a professor recommended. Dotts works as an aircraft maintenance technician while taking classes at the Arizona college.

Then one day while working in the campus makerspace he heard team members talking. He offered a few suggestions. The team members appreciated his tips and Dotts eventually joined the team. That first year he had minor roles. But before the start of the 2023-2024 he agreed to be Desert Star Robotics team’s chief executive officer.

At the 2024 MATE ROV World Championship, Dotts and his Desert Star Robotics teammates won second place in the PIONEER Class where they competed against other two-year colleges. (The team is in purple in this video about the 2024 competition.)

Dotts received the international competition’s top award – the Martin Klein MATE MARINER Award that includes a $1,000 cash award.

Each year the award is presented by Klein, who is the inventor of the side scan sonar, to a student who demonstrates not only technical aptitude, “but a passion and commitment to the field of marine science and technology,” according to Jill Zande, MATE’s executive director.

Zande reported that the judge who nominated Dotts called him “a prodigy” and in his notes added “But he and the world [have] yet to realize it."

During a plenary session discussion with three other alumni of ATE grant-funded projects at the 2024 Advanced Technological Education (ATE) Principal Investigators’ Conference and in an interview at the conference, Dotts shared insights he gained from his five-plus years of working as an aviation technician and two years of participating in ROV competitions.

The National Applied Artificial Intelligence Consortium (NAAIC) is a new NSF ATE-funded initiative that addresses the growing demand for skilled AI professionals in industries nationwide. A collaboration between Miami Dade College, Houston Community College, and Maricopa County Community College District, NAAIC serves as a bridge between community college academia and industry. By developing innovative training programs, offering mentorship, and fostering partnerships with tech giants like Intel, AWS, Microsoft, and Google, NAAIC empowers community colleges to prepare students for impactful careers in AI.

To tell us more about the work of NAAIC, ATE Impacts interviewed NAAIC Co-PI, Antonio Delgado Fornaguera. Antonio is Miami Dade College’s Vice President of Innovation and as such, has secured over $50 million in grants and has launched key programs like the first Bachelor and Associate degrees in Applied AI in Florida, the NSA-designated Cybersecurity Center of the Americas, and the Electric Vehicle Training Center in collaboration with Tesla.

Through NAAIC, Antonio and his team are advancing the education and training of a diverse technical workforce. By creating pathways to industry-aligned AI certifications, supporting faculty professional development, and building a vibrant community of practice, NAAIC ensures that community colleges remain essential to shaping the future of applied AI education.

Can you talk a little about the creation of NAAIC? What needs in the workforce did you see that led to the development of this consortium? 

The National Applied AI Consortium (NAAIC) was created to address a critical shortage of skilled AI professionals and meet the growing demand for workforce development in artificial intelligence. As AI reshapes industries, employers need a workforce that is not only technically proficient but also capable of applying AI to real-world industry challenges. Community colleges play a vital role in addressing this need, as they can provide accessible, practical training programs that are aligned with local and regional workforce demands. With their focus on affordability and flexible learning paths, community colleges are uniquely positioned to offer hands-on, industry-relevant AI training, making it possible for a broader and more diverse student population to enter the AI field. 

NAAIC draws on the practical experience and leadership of pioneering institutions like Miami Dade College (MDC), Houston Community College (HCC), and Maricopa County Community College District (MCCCD), which are the first colleges in the U.S. to develop and implement undergraduate AI degrees. These community colleges bring unique insights into AI workforce development, having created some of the nation’s earliest degree programs tailored to the demands of modern industries in collaboration with companies like Intel, Microsoft, AWS and Google. Their initiatives address the critical shortage of skilled AI professionals by equipping students with foundational and applied AI knowledge that is directly transferable to the workforce. 

Sharyl A. Majorski has come full circle in the Advanced Technological Education (ATE) program. Her first involvement began 15 years ago when she attended an ATE professional development program for tribal college educators. She was then an adjunct instructor. Now she is the tribal college consultant to Environmental and Natural Resources Technology (EARTh) Center.

To community college educators who want to build effective partnerships with Indigenous communities, Majorski suggests attending a tribal event and showing respect. “True respect values the people from the very beginning of a concept and listens to what they have to say throughout,” she said.

Majorski’s outreach efforts for the EARTh Center are informed by her work with students as an adjunct chemistry and physics instructor at the Saginaw Chippewa Tribal College and as a chemistry lab coordinator at Central Michigan University (CMU).

In 2009 and 2010 Majorski participated in the Tribal College Fellows Institutes offered by the National Partnership for Environmental Technology Education (PETE) with ATE support in collaboration with the Advanced Technology Environmental and Education Center (ATEEC).

She used what she learned at the institutes in multiple ways. First, she added an undergraduate research project at the Saginaw Chippewa Tribal College where students studied the Chippewa River. Students examined water quality through various chemical tests and collected aquatic macroinvertebrates as water quality indicators. Then she helped the college obtain a $400,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. At CMU she and colleagues wrote a proposal that received a $190,688 Course, Curriculum and Laboratory Improvement grant from the National Science Foundation to purchase equipment for undergraduate researchers to use.

In spring 2024 Majorski moderated discussions at the EARTh Center’s summit with 12 tribal college educators and a tribal community elder. Summit participants’ insights are being incorporated into a best practices guide that the EARTh Center is developing. The summit participants also recommended topics for the weeklong Fellows Institute for Tribal Faculty that the EARTh Center will offer in June 2025 on Beaver Island, Michigan.

Majorski provided written responses to questions about building relationships with tribal college educators and how she sustains partnerships. She also has multiple suggestions about things that educators can do to improve their connections with Native American communities.

As dual enrollment (DE) programs continue to grow, with nearly 2.5 million students participating, DE programs offer a pathway to higher education for historically underserved communities. However, despite the potential for DE to create more equitable access to college, many students from low-income and marginalized backgrounds face barriers that limit their participation. To better understand the needs of these students, the Community College Research Center (CCRC) conducted a study in 2022-23, interviewing 97 predominantly Black, Hispanic, and low-income students across Florida and Texas. The findings revealed six key "wants" that educators can use to think about when participating or developing courses for DE.

1. Students Want to Know About DE Earlier

Many students first hear about DE through family members or by chance in high school. Early awareness can help underserved students better prepare for college-level coursework and take full advantage of DE opportunities. Community colleges should start outreach in middle school, using community resources like local media, community centers, and even elementary school events to spread awareness. Outreach efforts like short videos, such as ATE's Student Success Stories, can grab attention more quickly and inform young students about pathways. 

A geographic information systems (GIS) project has gained extraordinary momentum in the two years since its Advanced Technological Education grant funding ended.  

The project led by J. Scott Sires, a geospatial technology professor at Dallas College’s Brookhaven Campus, has had these recent achievements:    

• A service learning experience that involved students in mapping part of Brookhaven Campus led to Dallas College hiring students as interns to create three-dimensional floor plans of facilities on   seven campuses and at 15 centers.
• During the first 16 months of this floor-plan mapping project, 10 interns completed scans of 80% of the college’s 5.5 million square feet of property. College administrators are pleased with the high quality, multi-use data that the interns have gathered more quickly than anticipated.  
• In July the college hired one of the interns as a facility space analyst. Sorting the field data to make it useful to facility managers and first responders is one of the tasks of this newly created role. The college’s chief facilities officer reports he would like to hire more GIS program alumni in the future.  
• The sequence of stackable GIS credentials—including an 18-hour dual-credit, high school program—that Sires developed from his ATE grant work was approved recently by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board for statewide use.
• Other Texas higher education institutions are evaluating the intern training materials and the GIS curriculum for potential adoption and adaptation.
• Sires received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the GeoTech Center this summer.

Sires said the Mentor-Connect mentoring he received in 2017 to prepare the ATE grant proposal, which won a $224,000 grant by the National Science Foundation in 2018, has “led to some opportunities that now are blooming ... And so that’s exciting.”

The 2024 ATE Principal Investigators’ Conference is coming up on October 23-25, at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C.!

More than 850 NSF ATE grantees and project partners from various educational sectors will convene to address critical issues in advanced technological education, spanning disciplines like advanced manufacturing technologies, agricultural and environmental technologies, biological and chemical technologies, engineering technologies, information and security technologies, micro and nanotechnologies, and more. The event brings together representatives from community colleges, business and industry, secondary school systems, and four-year colleges.

For projects and centers old and new, the annual PI Conference offers a chance to share experiences, collaborate, learn, and meet other members of the ATE community. Whether you are a first-time attendee or a seasoned participant, now is an excellent time to double-check and ensure your project or center is ready for the big event.

To support your preparation efforts, here is some information you may find helpful:

ATE Central Centers and Projects Map

The Centers and Projects map is a great way to learn about possible collaborators in your field or region and identify who may be at the PI conference. With the map, you can search through projects and centers by area of the country or by general subject area. Now is also a good time to ensure that your project or center's record is up to date. Let us know if you have new resources, a new project description, or other social media outlets. We can best support and amplify your efforts with up-to-date information about your project or center and related deliverables.

PI Meeting App

Plan which sessions to attend and track your PI meeting experiences with the annual PI meeting app. This year's app will be available in October, so watch for it on the Conference page.

Getting Started for New Grantees

This pre-conference workshop is recommended for all principal investigators, co-principal investigators, and other team members involved in newly awarded projects and centers. Held in-person on Wednesday, October 23, from 12:00 pm to 3:00 pm, the workshops will cover the reporting and financial requirements of the ATE grant while connecting new members with other projects and centers that can help them successfully manage, evaluate, and report on their projects. ATE Central and others from the ATE community and NSF will be presenting at the session, so it’s a great place to connect and ask any questions. Sign up when registering for the conference.

ATE Community Resources

Many free tools and resources are available throughout the ATE community to help prepare your project or center for the PI conference. Be sure to check out EvaluATE, MentorConnect, and AACC, among others.

Navigating the DC Area

The conference provides breakfast and lunch on the 24th, and breakfast on the 25th. Attendees will have the opportunity to explore the surrounding area for other meals.

Right across the street from the Omni Shoreham is Open City, a cafe offering brunch, coffee, and pizza all day. If you have time between sessions, the Smithsonian National Zoo is steps away from the conference hotel! For more about what’s happening in and around the DC area, check out Destination DC.

Information about how to register can be found on the conference registration page. The registration deadline is September 26th.

Check out the PI Conference's website and FAQ for more information about the conference. Don’t hesitate to contact us at [email protected] and let us know how we can support your ongoing efforts. We look forward to seeing you in DC!

To help two-year colleges prepare competitive proposals to the National Science Foundation’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Program (S-STEM) program the Community College S-STEM Network (CCSN) is offering a virtual, multi-week workshop beginning in October.

Thanks to a current Dear Colleague Letter to the Advanced Technological Education (ATE) community, ATE grantees may also apply for S-STEM funding for up to $1 less than 20 percent of their original ATE grant awards and one of the usual S-STEM funding tracks.

The ATE supplemental awards, however, are for scholarships only. They do not include funding for student services, faculty, staff, or institutional indirect costs of typical S-STEM awards, which begin at $1 million for six years and provide at least $600,000 for scholarships.

S-STEMs are last dollar scholarships that cover up to $15,000 annually of low-income, academically talented STEM majors’ unmet financial needs. Institutions submitting S-STEM proposals determine their costs of attendance, but these expenses can include not only tuition, fees, and books, but living expenses such as housing, transportation, and child care.

“This can be really transformative to people in community college communities,” said David R. Brown, one of the principal investigators of the project entitled Developing and Sharing Research on Low-Income Community College Student Decision-Making and Pathways in STEM.

The other principal investigator is Michelle Van Noy, director of the Education and Employment Research Center (EERC) at the School of Management and Labor Relations at Rutgers. The project is supported by a pair of collaborative grants, National Science Foundation (NSF) Award 2224671 to the Foundation for California Community Colleges and NSF Award 2224623 to Rutgers University.

Brown and Van Noy are leading the Community College S-STEM Network (CCSN) with a team of researchers who are focusing on how S-STEM students make decisions and what helps them persist to embark on STEM careers.

One of CCSN’s initiatives also assists community college faculty and staff members in navigating the S-STEM proposal process.

CCSN is currently taking applications for its free S-STEM Proposal Preparation Workshop. Selected individuals will meet online weekly for an hour beginning at 3:30 p.m. (Eastern) on Fridays from October 11 to February 28, to help them submit S-STEM grant proposals in advance of the program’s deadline on March 4, 2025.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) annually funds approximately 12,000 new awards, with an average funding duration of three years. Each year some of those new awards are supported by the ATE Program, which focuses on improving and expanding educational programs for skilled workers in high-tech STEM fields. ATE grantees concentrate on a range of fields, including advanced manufacturing, agriculture and environment, bio and chemical, information and security, and micro and nanotechnologies and are based primarily at two-year institutions across the nation. This year we celebrate our new grantees by highlighting four newly funded projects from the 2024 funding cycle. 

Southwestern College Micro-Nano Technology Technical Education Certificate Program

This project addresses the critical national need for a well-prepared workforce in micro- and nano-technology (MNT), a field with growing significance in sectors like electronics, energy security, and biotechnology. MNT involves engineering systems to manipulate matter at micro- and nano-scales, leading to novel technologies with special properties. Despite its importance, opportunities for two-year college students to prepare for MNT careers are limited. The project aims to provide structured educational opportunities for traditional and non-traditional students, particularly from underrepresented and economically disadvantaged backgrounds, to gain the skills necessary for entry-level technical careers in MNT. Key objectives include creating pathways to high-tech careers, developing a mentoring program, recruiting STEM students, refining the curriculum with industry input, and sharing the project's pedagogical model with other institutions. Partnerships with the University of California at San Diego and the Pennsylvania State University Microelectronics and Nanomanufacturing Consortium for Veterans will offer hands-on training and enhance the curriculum, ensuring graduates are ready to enter the MNT workforce.

The Cyber Fellows Advanced Technological Education (ATE) project at Forsyth Technical Community College in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, is cracking the code for growing a corps of educators to teach cybersecurity.  

Cyber Fellows Principal Investigator Thomas “Tony” W. Brown III explained that the ATE grant awarded by the National Science Foundation in 2021 has been a catalyst for the college to increase its adjunct cybersecurity faculty from six in fall 2021 to 13 in fall 2023. Seven of the 13 instructors were women, and six of the 13 were individuals from racial and ethnic populations historically underrepresented in cybersecurity.

“We were very fortunate to get this grant, and they [the National Science Foundation] essentially gave us everything that we asked for,” Brown said. In addition to leading the Cyber Fellows project, Brown is department chair of Forsyth Tech’s Davis iTec Cybersecurity Center and program coordinator for network management at the North Carolina college.

The ATE grant covers the tuition and related costs for middle school and high school educators to take four cybersecurity courses at Forsyth Tech and a two-week boot camp to prepare for the CompTIA Security+ exam. The grant also covers the fee for the exam, which is the current industry standard for entry-level cybersecurity roles.

Educators who complete the four-course curriculum for Cyber Fellows earn Forsyth Tech’s Information Technology (IT)-Cybersecurity certificate and receive a $250 stipend; those who take the industry exam receive another $250 stipend. The Cyber Fellows also receive travel support to attend one professional conference.

Victoria Ferrell, who was in the first cohort of six Cyber Fellows in 2021, said she was “blown away” by the incentives when she heard Brown’s recruitment pitch to the staff at a GenCyber summer program where she was working. “It kept getting better and better,” she said of the list of benefits.

After more than two decades as a high school career and technical education teacher Ferrell zipped through the required cybersecurity courses at Forsyth Tech and became an adjunct instructor in fall 2022. When the program coordinator position for the department opened, she applied for it and was hired by the college. She is now a co-principal investigator of the Cyber Fellows grant.  

Brown and Ferrell were interviewed via Zoom for this ATE Impacts Blog post. Their article “K-12 Educational Cybersecurity Scaling Program Designed to Meet Industry Needs” in the Journal of Advanced Technological Education (J ATE)  explains the project’s effort to equip educators “to cultivate a future generation of cybersecurity professionals,” bridge the cybersecurity talent gap, and foster diversity.

Brown and Ferrell were among the 11 teams of community college educators who participated in J ATE Connect, which provided coaches to community college educators who had not previously written and submitted manuscripts to peer-reviewed journals.