The Take Flight STEM Pathway, a partnership between Rice University, Lone Star College (LSC) and San Jacinto College (SJC), is building on its efforts to expand education access and increase the number of students who complete STEM degrees.
Rice and LSC celebrated the renewal of a memorandum of understanding and the signing of an articulation agreement to allow transfer students in LSC’s Take Flight Program to receive Rice credit for core science, technology, engineering and mathematics courses completed at LSC. The transfer of course credits is key to transfer students’ timely progress to degree completion.
“We are here to further the relationship between two institutions as Houston begins to grow,” said Dwight Smith, LSC vice chancellor for academic and workforce success, whose daughter is a Rice graduate. “We’re so fortunate to come to an agreement and develop it with Rice because you’ve already provided wonderful experiences for our students and we look forward to working with you in the years to come.”
“One of the shared values that makes this Take Flight program and partnership so fruitful is Lone Star College and Rice University’s shared commitment to student success — and that means every student’s success,” said Amy Dittmar, Rice’s Howard R. Hughes provost and executive vice president for academic affairs.
“What we’ve achieved together is, above all, the product of our two institutions’ shared values and commitment to educational excellence and to expanding access to educational opportunity for students from across the greater Houston area, particularly for students from underrepresented or underresourced communities,” said Matthew Taylor, Rice senior associate provost for strategic and educational initiatives.
Katharine Caruso, LSC associate vice chancellor for the Honors College and international education, referred to the Take Flight Program as a testament to “good neighbors and to access and excellence.” She thanked the Rice faculty, many of whom attended the celebration, for their work with LSC students.
“You have no idea how many messages we get from our students about the wonderful, transformative experiences they are taking part in with you,” said Caruso.
LSC Board of Trustee and alumnus Mike Sullivan also attended.
Take Flight is a cohort cocurricular pathway developed and offered in partnership with Rice for LSC and SJC Honors College students interested in STEM careers. The program has two tracks: one for first-year students and one for second-year students. Both groups have access to specialized curricular and cocurricular STEM opportunities collaboratively offered by Rice and LSC STEM faculty and mentors. For the first-year track, programming focuses on career exploration, while second-year students receive STEM-specific advising on selective transfer application writing and transfer preparedness.
Take Flight students also have access to specialized application support for funded, summer research experiences for undergraduates, which are offered by Rice and other sites around the country. The Provost’s Office and Rice faculty members have provided nearly $300,000 in research stipends for Take Flight students since the program’s inception.
Three Take Flight students who participated in full-time summer research experiences spoke during the celebratory signing. After her first year as an Honors College student at LSC and a participant in Take Flight, Alexis Lopez conducted research at Cornell University on using computer vision to study plant health. The experience led her to be the first author of a published paper she presented at conferences around the country, including the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. She was recently announced as a Barry Goldwater Scholarship recipient.
Jocel Angelo Reyes spent his summer interning in a nanotechnology lab with Matteo Pasquali, director of Rice’s Carbon Hub, professor of chemistry and materials science and nanoengineering and the A.J. Hartsook Professor of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.
Carlos Carreon completed an internship on gasoline fractional distillation, followed by a computational research internship with Princeton University in the Czech Republic, illustrating the quality and versatility of his honors coursework at LSC and the impact of the STEM programming and advising he received as a Take Flight student.
All three said they are happy to serve as representatives of the program that gave them the opportunity to apply the research skills they learned as LSC honors students.
“The Honors College created these foundational research skills,” said Lopez.
The internship “invigorated my passion for research,” said Reyes. “Without these programs, I don’t know how much of that would be possible.”
The research experiences also helped build interpersonal skills, said Carreon. “I got to practice my ability as a listener.”
Established in September 2022 by Rice, LSC and SJC, Take Flight began to address the barriers that often prevent first-generation, low-income and historically excluded students from attaining a four-year degree in STEM.