Increasing the Number of Underrepresented Minorities in Astronomy at the Undergraduate, Graduate, and Postdoctoral Levels (Paper I)

TL;DR

Achieving demographic parity in astronomy requires increasing underrepresented minorities' graduate degrees through targeted early engagement, partnerships with minority-serving institutions, and leveraging STEM backgrounds in innovative research areas.

Contribution

This paper highlights the importance of early research engagement, regional partnerships, and bridging programs to significantly boost minority representation in astronomy.

Findings

Need to increase minority PhDs by a factor of 5-10 in a decade.

Early research engagement is critical for minority retention.

Instrument development and data science are promising engagement avenues.

Abstract

If the ethnic makeup of the astronomy profession is to achieve parity with the general population within one generation (~30 years), the number of underrepresented minorities earning graduate degrees in astronomy and astrophysics must increase in the coming decade by a factor of 5 to 10. To accomplish this, the profession must develop and invest in mechanisms to more effectively move individuals across critical educational junctures to the PhD and beyond. Early and continuous research engagement starting in the undergraduate years is critical to this vision, in which the federally funded research internship programs (e.g. NSF REU, NASA GSRP) and national centers/observatories play a vital role. Regionally based partnerships with minority-serving institutions (MSIs) are crucial for tapping extant pools of minority talent, as are post-baccalaurate and/or masters degree "bridging" programs that provide critical stepping stones to the PhD. Because of the strong undergraduate physics, engineering, and computer science backgrounds of many students from MSIs, we suggest that instrument development and large scale computing/data-mining are particularly promising avenues for engagement in the coming decade.