Three years. 19 partner sites. A workforce pipeline that is already paying off.
We’re proud to share the results of the RoboMasterminds Three-Year Summative Impact Report, closing out this Department of Defense-funded STEM pipeline program supported by the National Defense Education Program (NDEP) in partnership with DEVCOM ARL and NSWC Indian Head Division.
The reach speaks for itself. Partner sites grew from 5 to 19, and students served grew from 233 to 880 or more in a single grant cycle, nearly quadrupling in three years across communities near Army and Navy research installations in Maryland.
But the real story is what happens at the top of the pipeline. Among the program’s interns and near-peer mentors:
- 100% would recommend the program, two years running
- 4 or more DoD SMART Scholarship recipients
- Full-time federal hires at ARL and ETC
- An internship at Lockheed Martin and a post-baccalaureate fellowship at NIH
- 2 or more published papers
- A patent in process from hydrogel tissue simulant research
- A participant-founded startup that has raised $60,000 or more in non-dilutive funding
This is what a functioning STEM workforce pipeline looks like: students who start with Sumobots and drones and end up at the bench, in the lab, and on the payroll of the institutions that trained them.
Huge thanks to Virginia To and Christine Hosto and her talented team at ETCMD for building and leading this program with such care.
Grateful to have served as an external evaluator on this grant.
