The worsening water crisis in California comes at a time when engineers are ill prepared to design and build civil infrastructure responsive to the challenges that lie ahead. In this proposed RET we will immerse community college engineering teachers in a multi-disciplinary research experience to identify and mitigate (through engineering design) human health concerns associated with capturing, treating, and reusing dry and wet weather urban runoff. In an effort to help community college teachers get their students more interested and involved in STEM-related research, a UC Irvine civil and environmental engineering professor has teamed up with the university’s Office of Access and Inclusion. The result is ROCCT – Research Opportunities for Community College Teachers – a three-year, $600,000 National Science Foundation grant that designates UCI as a Research Experience for Teachers site, and the gathering point for participants from four local community colleges: Irvine Valley, Saddleback, Cypress and Fullerton.

Contribute to the development, implementation, and monitoring of green technology for treating and reusing urban runoff;

Forge new alliances between units within UCI (Engineering, Social Ecology, Undergraduate Education), and between UCI and local community colleges and government agencies;

Catalyze educational innovation in community colleges that service students from backgrounds traditionally underrepresented in STEM fields;

Generate new teaching modules on urban water sustainability that utilize cutting edge pedagogical techniques designed to create excitement about STEM education; and