A PERSONAL CALLING
Huff, who also works as a nursing professor at IUPUI, says she was drawn to the director position because her two children benefited from similar programs. Her daughter used an AT&T scholarship designed to increase the number of Black engineers to attend Duke University. She is now a medical resident in surgery for head and neck injuries at Washington University in St. Louis.
Her son was a National Achievement scholar and now is studying business at Florida A&M University.
Most students in the MRSP "have fairly good supportive families, but many times their parents never went to college," Huff says. "When that's the case, sometimes everybody else in the family will ask students, ‘Why are you spending so much time on this studying?' "
The program invites parents and families to MRSP meetings and luncheons three times a year. To remain eligible, students must maintain a B average and "if a student falls below 3.0, we send a letter to the student and the parent," Huff says. "And if they need a tutor, we have funds in the program to get them a tutor."
Similar programs elsewhere have folded after a year or two because of poor funding. Stocum says MRSP is here for the long term and private money might be on the way. A university-wide fund-raising campaign could bring the science department $1 million, and MRSP would draw future operating money from the science department's coffers, Stocum says.
Huff says she feels good about the program's chance for long-term survival. The program boasts a 95 percent retention rate over four years, while the university's retention rate for all students is 21 percent and 12 percent for all minorities.
"We've produced results," says Huff. n