NSF Awards UTEP-led Team Nearly $3 Million to Build Pathways to Grad School for Low-income Students
New national hub to investigate how institutional practices strengthen STEM pathways
EL PASO, Texas (Oct. 20, 2026) – The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded nearly $3 million to a team led by The University of Texas at El Paso to explore how colleges and universities can help low-income students pursue graduate degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). The funding will support the launch of the S-STEM Hub: Translating Undergraduate Success into Graduate Opportunity, a five-year national research collaborative.
The project is led by principal investigator Jesús Cisneros, Ph.D., professor and chair of the UTEP Department of Educational Leadership and Foundations, and co-principal investigator Azuri González, Ed.D., also from UTEP's Diana Natalicio Institute for Hispanic Student Success and the Alliance of Hispanic Serving Research Universities (HSRU).
“Graduate opportunity is shaped not only by individual programs, but by broader institutional environments in which students learn, conduct research and prepare for their futures,” said Cisneros. “The S-STEM Hub creates an unprecedented opportunity for researchers to work collaboratively across institutions to better understand those conditions and generate evidence that strengthens graduate pathways for students nationwide.”
The S-STEM Hub will bring together investigators from research-intensive universities across the country to examine how institutional practices, undergraduate experiences and organizational environments influence graduate aspirations, readiness and post-baccalaureate pathways. The initiative also aims to strengthen institutional research capacity and translate findings into evidence-informed practices that can be adapted by colleges and universities nationwide.
Rather than examining individual programs in isolation, the S-STEM Hub will investigate how institutional ecosystems – including advising, mentoring, undergraduate research, transfer pathways, professional development and other student support strategies – shape graduate STEM pathways.
The hub seeks to build on the collaborative infrastructure of the HSRU while intentionally engaging a broader national community of researchers, institutional leaders and higher education partners.
The UTEP team is joined by co-principal investigators Assata Zerai, Ph.D., from the University of New Mexico; Igor Paprotny, Ph.D., from the University of Illinois Chicago; and Vanessa E. Woods, Ph.D., from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Collectively, the team brings expertise in higher education, STEM education, institutional transformation, interdisciplinary research and collaborative network development to the new NSF-funded initiative.
“One of the HSRU’s greatest strengths is our ability to bring research-intensive universities together around questions that no single institution can answer alone,” said González, who serves as executive director of the alliance. “By studying graduate pathways collaboratively across institutions, we can generate richer evidence, learn from one another’s experiences and translate that knowledge into practices that strengthen opportunity not only for our institutions, but for higher education more broadly.”
Through annual convenings, collaborative research teams, comparative institutional studies and dissemination activities, the hub plans to create a national learning community dedicated to strengthening graduate STEM opportunity for low-income students.
Findings from the project will be shared through scholarly publications, conferences, implementation resources and national partnerships.
Last Updated on October 20, 2026 at 12:00 AM | Originally published October 20, 2026
By MC Staff UTEP Marketing and Communications
