Diversity Program Consortium (DPC) Coordination and Evaluation Center (CEC) at UCLA

The Diversity Program Consortium (DPC) Coordination and Evaluation Center (CEC) at UCLA is designed to assess the impact of specific institutional and consortium-wide interventions on student, faculty, and institutional outcomes, including the impact of biomedical training and mentoring on transformation of institutional culture. The overall purpose of the CEC at UCLA is to provide the DPC's grantees with coordination and operational support, conduct data coordination/collection and program evaluation, and disseminate best practices. The overarching research and evaluation question is whether the Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity (BUILD) and the National Research Mentoring Network (NRMN) programs improve student, faculty/researcher, and/or institutional short and intermediate outcomes that lead to a highly representative biomedical workforce and transform institutional culture, and how different program components differentially affect these outcomes. Using proven evaluation metrics and methods, the CEC Evaluation Core (EC) is assessing the attainment of hallmarks of career success, including core competencies, by DPC participants at multiple career stages, as well as documenting indicators of institutional transformation. DPC participants are from all backgrounds. The CEC is a critical Evaluation Core resource and partner.

The NIH Diversity Program, Coordination and Evaluation Center (CEC) is a strong collaborator of the UCLA CTSI and will jointly continue efforts to enhance workforce diversity. The National Institutes of Health has awarded over $25 million for fiscal years 2019-2024. The CEC uses mixed methods (quantitative and qualitative data) that are analyzed using a quasi-experimental approach to distill the best evidence from BUILD and NRMN for developing new approaches that engage all students and junior researchers, including those from backgrounds underrepresented in biomedical sciences, and to prepare them to thrive in the NIH-funded workforce. Collectively, BUILD, NRMN and CEC in collaboration with the NIH have established a national consortium to develop, implement, and evaluate approaches to encourage individuals to start, stay, and succeed in biomedical research careers: (1) NIH Diversity Consortium Coordination and Evaluation Center (CEC) at UCLA includes Co-PIs Keith Norris and Teresa Seeman who are also UCLA CTSI leaders in Community Engagement and Research; (2) Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity (BUILD); and (3) National Research Mentoring Network (NRMN). These efforts of the BUILD/NRMN/CEC will lead to greater representation of students not traditionally in the scientific pipeline. It also positions UCLA and the UCLA CTSI as leaders in innovative, best practices for improving the capacity of non research-intensive institutions to foster inclusive science and train a greater number of traditionally underrepresented undergraduates who are pursuing STEM careers. The UCLA CTSI will work with Drs. Norris and Seeman to improve recruitment and retention of trainees at the four UCLA CTSI institutions and in the KL2 Program.

Working together with the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and other DPC initiatives, the CEC identified a set of key outcomes, or Hallmarks of Success, to identify critical features of student and faculty career development, along with institutional changes that could be measured over time to assess the impact of DPC initiatives to enhance and support diversity in the biomedical workforce.  

To achieve these goals, the CEC is comprised of four cores, or teams, each of which is charged with carrying out the consortium’s mission: the Administrative Core, the Communication & Dissemination Core, the Data Coordination Core and the Evaluation Core. Each team is led by a director and co-lead, as well as an external advisory board that provides guidance. 

For more information, please visit the DPC CEC website.

Last updated
February 10, 2025