About Undergraduate Education (DUE)

Mission:  To promote excellence in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education for all students.

The Division accomplishes its mission through the following goals and strategies:

Table Outlining DUE Goals and Strategies
GoalsStrategies
Provide Leadership
  • Promote cutting-edge efforts, risk-taking, and continuous innovation in developing new practices and ideas.
  • Help shape national priorities to further educational innovation and research.
  • Direct efforts to increase the diversity of STEM communities.
Support Curriculum Development
  • Stimulate and support research on learning.
  • Promote development of exemplary materials and strategies for education.
  • Support model assessment programs and practices.
  • Effect broad dissemination of effective pedagogy and materials.
  • Enable long-term sustainability of effective activities.
Prepare the Workforce
  • Promote technological, quantitative, and scientific literacy.
  • Support an increase in diversity, size, and quality of the next generation of STEM professionals who enter the workforce with two- or four-year degrees or who continue their studies in graduate and professional schools.
  • Invest in the nation's future K-12 teacher workforce.
  • Fund research to evaluate and improve workforce initiatives.
Foster Connections
  • Facilitate communication across disciplinary boundaries.
  • Foster connections between all educational levels from K-12 through graduate school and between academia, industry, and professional societies.
  • Encourage faculty to combine teaching and discipline-based research.
  • Collaborate with research communities and with NSF research directorates.

DUE's current programs, which are described in the documents on this Web site, constitute a comprehensive approach to strengthening STEM education at two- and four-year colleges and universities by improving curricula, instruction, laboratories, infrastructure, assessment, diversity of students and faculty, and collaborations.  These programs encompass most of the activities supported by the Division; however, additional ideas and mechanisms will be considered by DUE staff at any time.

For more information on the Division of Undergraduate Education, please visit the DU(E-News) website.

Credit: Photo from Advanced Technological Education (ATE) Centers Impact 2011 (www.atecenters.org)