Looking Back Over 30 Years Doctoral Fellowships at At&T Labs 1972 2002
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Session____ Looking Back Over 30 Years--AT&T Labs and Lucent Bell Laboratories Ph.D. Fellowship Programs 1972 - 2002 Elaine P. Laws--AT&T Labs During 2002, AT&T Labs and Lucent Bell Laboratories will celebrate the 30th anniversary of their sponsorship of Ph.D. fellowship programs for under-represented minorities 1and women in science and engineering. In the early 1970s AT&T's research and development organization, then known as "Bell Laboratories," initiated efforts to recruit minority students for technical positions within the Labs. These efforts were the result of suggestions from the African American and women's communities within the R&D organization. Since the numbers of under-represented minority and women students graduating with Ph.D.s in disciplines relevant to the work of the Labs was very small, the Labs leadership realized that they would have to take an active role in identifying, encouraging, and supporting students in these groups to pursue studies in mathematics and engineering. This paper summarizes the common histories and goals of the programs, their launch and operation, their use of internships and mentors and the results of the combined AT&T and Lucent programs over the 30 year period of their operation. Introduction Doctoral fellowship and grant programs were launched at AT&T's Bell Laboratories for under-represented minorities in 1972 and for women in 1974. They were respectively named the Cooperative Research Fellowship Program (CRFP) and the Graduate Research Fellowship Program for Women (GRPW). These two programs were funded by the Bell Laboratories research and development organization until 1992 at which time the AT&T Foundation assumed responsibility for their funding while Bell Labs R&D staff continued to support student recruiting, selection, internships and mentoring of students in these programs. With AT&T's trivestiture in 1996, Bell Labs was split between AT&T and the newly formed Lucent Technologies. The Bell Labs name was retained by Lucent, and AT&T's R&D organization became known as AT&T Labs. The fellowship and grant programs continued in the two companies with each company's foundations providing funding for the programs. The students in progress in the programs were split between the two organizations based on their disciplines and research focus and the R&D staff of each organization continued its efforts in recruiting, selecting, and providing internships and mentoring for the students. AT&T Labs combined the elements of the fellowship and grant programs for minorities and women into one program and named its program the AT&T Labs Fellowship Program (ALFP) while Lucent Bell Laboratories continued to maintain the two programs separately. 8.829.1 Page 1 Minorities considered under-represented in engineering, mathematics, and science include African Americans, Native Americans, and Hispanics. "Proceedings of the 2003 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright 2003, American Society for Engineering Education" Fellowship and Grant Program History In the early 1970s when the effort to develop Doctoral fellowship and grant programs was undertaken, the Bell Laboratories R&D leadership had few models on which to base their programs. Programs such as the National Consortium for Graduate Degrees for Minorities in Engineering and Science (GEM) were introduced in 1974 to support students in completing Master's degrees. Other minority fellowship programs were initiated later, such as the National Science Foundation's Graduate Minority Fellowship Program2 and the Ford Foundation Fellowships for Minorities that began making awards in 1978 and 1980 respectively3. Each of these provided students with funds for graduate study. The Bell Laboratories program, however, from its earliest beginnings sought to build close relationships with the students chosen for its programs, providing mentoring and summer internships for them. The early supporters of the programs took a personal interest in the development and the success of the students. They worked to improve recruiting efforts through close contacts with universities where promising students might be found. They also worked with the Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs) as well as other colleges and universities to improve and expand their undergraduate curriculums to better prepare students for graduate school. They established committees of technical leaders to oversee the recruitment, selection, and progress of the students and assigned technical staff to work closely with students. In 1970’s underrepresented groups accounted for less than 2.0% of the Engineering and Physical Science doctoral degrees awarded to American citizens and permanent residents in the US4. In 1975 34 doctoral degrees in Engineering and 53 in the Physical sciences were awarded to students from under-represented minority groups. As is evident from the low number of doctoral degrees awarded to minorities 1970s, universities were not proactive and maybe risk-adverse when dealing with minority candidates. The process of considering and successfully guiding minorities to doctoral degrees was heavily weighted against success. The objective was to significantly increase the number of doctoral degrees awarded to minority candidates in technical areas of expertise present at Bell Labs. The first of the programs, CRFP, was started in 1972 by seeking highly qualified under- represented minority students enrolled from universities local to New Jersey Bell Labs facilities. The schools from which students were recruited were City College of New York, Columbia University, New York University, Polytechnic University, Rutgers University, Stevens Institute of Technology, and Princeton University. Students selected for the program spent the first summer after their senior year of college working at the Labs under the guidance of a technical mentor who was a member of the R&D staff. Top researchers were selected as mentors. They worked closely with students, guiding the student's work in a research project and monitoring their progress. 2 National Research Council, Minority Science Paths:National Science Foundation Minority Graduate Fellows of 1979-81(Washington,D.C.:National Academy Press, 1995) p.1. 3 National Research Council, Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship Recipients (Office of Scientific and Engineering Personnel, Fellowship Programs Unit, October 1996), p.2. 8.829.2 Page 4 National Science Foundation, Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities in Science and Engineering: 2000, (NSF, 2000) NSF 00-237, Appendix B, Table 4-12. "Proceedings of the 2003 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright 2003, American Society for Engineering Education" In the fall, the students went on to graduate school but maintained a relationship with their mentors who helped them navigate through their Ph.D. programs, acting as sounding boards and champions for the students as well as ensuring that they were making satisfactory progress towards their degrees. Bell Labs also provided financial support for graduate study. Since students had their own funds to pay for school and a stipend for their living expenses, they were not dependent on identifying funding through their university advisors or having to take on laboratory or teaching assistantships in order to finance their studies. This funding provided the students with full financial support while the mentoring provided professional support not available through other fellowship programs. In doing so, Bell Labs endorsed the student and became a stakeholder in the student's success . An additional feature of this program was that of the academic advisor who was selected by the Labs to act as an advocate for students in academic matters on the company's behalf. This neutral party could work with university graduate advisors on behalf of students to address issues that company mentors could not handle. Examples of such issues include interventions on behalf of students to help change the focus of their research, change graduate advisors, or adjust their programs based on unforeseen personal needs. In many cases this support made the difference in students being able to successfully complete their Ph.D. studies. In 1974 GRPW was launched as a result of the need to develop a program that would address the challenges of women pursing advanced degrees in the sciences. The concerns of competing in male dominated fields, the need for professional role models as well as the competitive nature and limited funding to support advanced studies in technical disciplines by women were contributing factors to the establishment of GRPW. In this program the awards were equally divided between fellowships and grants, while in CRFP only fellowships were awarded. Grants were designed to provide small annual stipends that could be used towards expenses not generally covered by other financial awards. Expenses covered by grants included funds for childcare, personal computing hardware and software and visits to other university research labs. Grant students were assigned mentors and were required to spend the first summer before attending graduate school as interns at the Labs, establishing close connections between them and their Bell Labs mentors. In the early years, four to five students were identified annually for fellowship or grant support in each of the CRFP and GRPW programs with support continuing for a five to six