About Us
The goal of the RISE program is to increase the number of under-represented students who go into scientific research areas such as biology, chemistry and behavioral sciences by increasing the number of students who apply to and complete doctoral programs.
There are two major components of the program — academic, which occurs predominantly in freshman and sophomors years, and research, which occurs mainly the juniors and senior years. The academic support in the form of workshops will be attached to all the historically difficult science classes, classes with failure rates of 35 percent or higher, but will decrease throughout the program as our students become more independent learners and hopefully need less and less help. The research aspect increases slowly through the program, with the first research experience between the freshman and sophomore years and ultimately we hope to place interested students in faculty labs during their junior and senior years. We also help students get internship and externship experiences all over the country during their summers.
One of the greatest benefits of this program is the sense of closeness and community that our students feel. The transition from high school to college is far more traumatic than most people realize or expect and having a tight group of friends can be an enormous help, especially in a school as large as Brooklyn College. Our students develop into a close group providing each other with lots of support, both academically and personally, to deal with the changes and challenges that they experience.
