Ensuring that all students, no matter their background, have fair access and opportunity to thrive in STEM disciplines is a core principle of the Higher Education Program. As articulated in the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation’s Commitment to Opportunity for All in Science, upholding this principle is a matter of fundamental justice and our path to ensuring that the best science is done.

Educational settings that include and celebrate people from different backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives promote collaboration, learning, and innovation. We know from experience that everyone benefits when this diversity is combined with organizational practices, policies, and cultures that provide individuals with the tools, resources, and support needed to succeed. The Higher Education program supports individuals and institutions that pursue these and other essential ingredients for scientific advancement that benefit our communities, nation, and the world.

Three equally important priorities guide the majority of our grantmaking. In particular, we seek to:

1. Invest in widening pathways to STEM graduate education. The pathway to and through STEM graduate education is broken for far too many students. Systemic barriers limit talented students’ opportunities because of who they are, where they’re from, how much money they have, and other unfair impediments. We seek grantees with the capacity and commitment to work toward removing all significant barriers, while maintaining opportunities for those who are already thriving, so that all talent can achieve their promise. Among other investments, we seek to widen educational pathways to and through master’s and doctoral STEM programs through the Exemplary Pathways to STEM Graduate Education initiative.
2. Empower universities to transform graduate education. Including all talent in the student body is crucial for the integrity, excellence, and contributions of science. Institutions and their STEM departments must pursue new, creative, and evidence-informed ways of ensuring that all students can thrive. This includes creating and enhancing law-attentive, student-centered programs and attending to institutional policies, practices, standards, and norms such that all students have the opportunities and resources they need to be successful. Through the Foundation’s University Centers for Exemplary Mentoring, Sloan Centers for Systemic Change, and Sloan Indigenous Graduate Partnership, we seek to empower STEM departmental leadership, faculty, and staff in doing just that while at the same time supporting graduate scholars though Sloan scholarships.
3. Support innovative efforts to include all talent in the STEM professoriate. By widening pathways to and through graduate education, we help to create a STEM ecosystem where students have the freedom to teach, study, and pursue knowledge and research in many forms. This requires institutions where talented faculty and students of all experiences, backgrounds, and perspectives can explore ideas and learn from one another. We are interested in efforts by institutions and organizations to transform the culture and climate of STEM departments and disciplines such that more individuals are attracted to the professoriate and thrive once there. Grantmaking in this area includes support for researchers who study the STEM professoriate.