Recent Outreach Initiatives for Non-Traditional Students at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory

PPPL has expanded its education and outreach efforts for non-traditional students. These programs are focused on increasing the diversity of applicants into our research internship programs and, eventually, our workforce. For example, we offer two summer workshops for Minority Serving Institutions, one for undergraduate students and the other for faculty. These are used to introduce plasma physics to those that may not have studied the field and to recruit into our SULI research internship program. We recently began collaborating with vocational high schools in NJ as part of our effort to recruit younger people into our high school internship program with the intent to attract new people into our technical workforce. Similarly, for several years we have collaborated with high schools in lower-income areas to identify students who might not normally apply. These are in addition to our ongoing efforts to attract women and other underrepresented groups into our research workforce pipeline. While the numbers are small, indications are that these efforts are having an immediate impact on the diversity of the applicant pool into our internship programs.