The Power of Mentoring Programs in Retaining Women and Black, Indigenous, and Students of Color in Undergraduate Computing Majors

This paper outlines the effectiveness of an undergraduate mentoring program offered through the Department of Computer Science at the University of Maryland in retaining historically marginalized undergraduate students in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and computer science (STEM-CS) majors. Each undergraduate teacher/mentor (called an Ambassador) is responsible for providing support for current university students or for K-12 computing outreach programs. Enrollment and survey data show that the Ambassador program is successful in retaining undergraduate computing majors in STEM-CS. Ambassadors indicated that they appreciated the community aspect of the Ambassador program and they felt empowered to solve diversity problems in STEM-CS.