# Lessons Learned from Virtual Transitions of Undergraduate Student Support
Programs due to the COVID-19 Pandemic

Tierra Candelaria New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, 801 Leroy Pl,
Socorro, NM 87801, USA  Qiana Hunt University of Michigan, 1085 S University,
Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA  Danielle Rowland Department of Astrophysics,
American Museum of Natural History, 200 Central Park West, New York, NY 10024,
USA

###### Abstract

The COVID-19 global pandemic spurred sudden and dramatic changes in the way
universities and research programs operate, often with negative consequences
that have disproportionately affected minorities, women, and people with low
income. These consequences compound the difficulties these groups faced prior
to the pandemic — in particular, the increased obstacles marginalized students
encounter while pursuing STEM career paths. The National Astronomy Consortium
(NAC) was founded to support underrepresented physics and astronomy students
by providing research opportunities and long-term mentoring. In response to
the pandemic and nation-wide shutdowns, the NAC shifted both its summer
research program and its annual fall conference to a fully-remote format.
Here, we discuss the changes the NAC made to achieve a successful virtual
transition, and provide temporary and long-term recommendations for programs
seeking to provide support to marginalized undergraduate and graduate
researchers moving forward.

##  1 Introduction

Even before the novel coronavirus escalated into the world-wide pandemic it is
today, institutions have struggled to get a handle on the widespread
disparities that persist in academia. There is much debate over how to recruit
and retain junior academics who are historically excluded from their
scientific communities along lines of race, gender, and economic status.
Summer research experiences for undergraduates have become a crucial tool for
addressing these issues at early career stages (e.g., Russell & Dye 2014).
However, the pandemic threatens to roll back the progress made on many other
fronts by introducing a new set of barriers that may limit the participation
of already marginalized populations within academia. Recent surveys reveal
that 1 in 10 young adults have had to relocate due to COVID-19 (Cohn 2021),
with a growing number citing financial problems as the most important reason
for the move. Furthermore, those working from home report having difficulty
feeling motivated, meeting deadlines, and getting work done without
interruptions, especially workers in education and scientific fields (Minkin
2021). There is also the issue of technological barriers, such as limited
access to the resources needed to reliably work from home. These collateral
consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately affect people of
color, women, people with low income, and intersections therein (Getachew et
al. 2020; Parker, Minkin & Bennett 2020; Barroso 2021). Students may find
themselves excluded from or unable to accept opportunities due to location and
pandemic restrictions, and unable to fully engage in academic and research
activities due to technological or logistical barriers. These inequities will
further drive the gap between marginalized and privileged academics well into
the future unless steps are taken today to mitigate the damage done by the
pandemic within the academic sphere.

Founded in 2013 by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) and
Associated Universities Inc. (AUI) in partnership with the National Society of
Black Physicists (NSBP) and several universities across the United States, the
National Astronomy Consortium (NAC) was devised as a means of addressing such
inequities prior to the onset of the pandemic. The mission of the NAC is to
increase the numbers of students from underrepresented and underserved groups
in STEM through a system based on the _Posse Foundation_ model (Bial 2016,
Grotheer 2019). Under normal circumstances, NAC students are chosen from a
pool of applicants and divided into cohorts hosted by partner institutions.
NAC students are given hands-on research experience through paid summer
internships, during which they participate in weekly cohort building and
professional development activities. At the end of the program, students have
an opportunity to present their work to fellow NAC students and alumni across
all partnered sites at the annual fall NAC conference. The NAC also provides
long-term financial support (e.g., travel funding to professional conferences
and graduate application fee waivers) and mentoring. One of the most important
aspects of the NAC program is continued student engagement with the program as
NAC alumni and as peer- and near-peer mentors to future cohorts of NAC
students. Thus, our students belong to an expansive network of support with
mentors who are committed to helping NAC students navigate academia long-term.

Typically, these opportunities are operated in-person, with students traveling
to 1 of 7 current partner sites to conduct their research. These sites were
encouraged to convert to an online format as the pandemic spread, which
introduced obstacles similar to those now faced by universities and research
institutions nationwide. In this paper, we address the challenges the NAC
faced in transitioning to a fully virtual format for both the summer research
portion and the annual NAC conference. The authors are graduate student alumni
of the NAC who hold leadership roles as peer- and near-peer mentors within the
program. Each was actively involved in the planning and implementing of NAC
projects over the past year, including the 2020 NAC summer program and the
annual conference. Here we detail our methods, evaluate the success of these
efforts, and provide recommendations for future virtual programming.

##  2 Survey Introduction

To provide context for the changes the NAC made to its programs and their
outcomes, we report the results of the NAC Alumni Survey, which was adapted
from the “Staying in Science” Alumni Survey (Podkul et al. 2018) and performed
from September through December 2020 via Qualtrics. The purpose of the survey
was to better understand the experiences of NAC students and alumni in college
and in research, especially within the context of the NAC and the services
offered through the organization. The survey also captured, in part, the
effect the COVID-19 pandemic had on participants’ education and research
situations. Participants received compensation in the form of one $25 Visa
gift card each for filling out the survey, which took approximately 20-30
minutes to complete. The survey was sent to all 72 NAC alumni and received 47
responses, 44 of which were completed in their entirety. Of the respondents,
approximately 48% (or 22 alumni) had graduated college, while 52% were
undergraduate students at the time the survey was conducted. Approximately 64%
of those who had already graduated (14 alumni) were enrolled in a graduate
program, with all but one enrolled in a doctoral program. The remaining 24
undergraduate students all anticipated graduating by 2024, with one-third
having planned to graduate in 2020 at the time of the survey.

By design, NAC serves a diverse student population, as reflected by the survey
results. Of the 41 respondents who answered the race and ethnicity portion of
the survey, approximately 38% identify as Black, one-third identify as white,
and approximately 15% selected “Other.” The least represented groups were East
Asian (6%), Native American and/or Alaska Native (4%), South Asian (2%), and
Native Hawaiian and/or Pacific Islander (2%). Nearly 32% identified as
Hispanic or Latinx. 75% out of 40 respondents reported English being the only
language spoken with their immediate family (compared to 15% stating that
English is never spoken with family). 44% of 41 respondents have at least one
parent who was born outside of the United States.

It should be reiterated, as previously explained, that minoritized students
are more likely to be affected long-term by the pandemic (e.g., Getachew et
al. 2020, CDC 2021). Ultimately, these students and alumni make up a small
sample size, so the results of this report and its applicability to a wider
community should be approached with caution. We note, however, that every
respondent reported that they would recommend the NAC to a friend, and more
than 95% stated that they felt that the NAC was useful. Considering this, and
taking the wide diversity of the respondents into account, we believe the
results of this survey and the outcomes of our remote summer research program
and conference during the pandemic can serve as a useful example for other
programs looking to improve and provide support to marginalized members of
their community.

##  3 Summer Research Experience

In the early months of 2020, NAC program leaders, like others around the U.S.,
were busy reviewing applications, solidifying projects and logistics, and
making offers to students without knowing the impending, drastic impact of the
novel coronavirus. By March, it became clear that we would have to
significantly adjust our program model to ensure the safety of our students,
mentors, and the general public. Of the students who responded to the NAC
Alumni Survey, 15 out of 44 respondents reported that their ability to
participate in summer research had changed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 3
respondents had a summer internship/job cancelled, and 14 had a summer
internship/job moved online. Because cancellations could be detrimental in the
long-term, especially to marginalized students, it was of the utmost
importance that we find a way to adjust the program, which was already set to
begin in June and last from 8 to 12 weeks, to accommodate the circumstances
rather than eliminating the summer program altogether. Here, we break down the
changes we made to the summer research program into two categories: 1)
research-related changes pertaining to the equipment and skill-building
opportunities provided for the students and the logistics of the program as a
whole; and 2) the addition of or changes to personal accommodations such as
cohort-building exercises and wellness checks aimed at addressing the
physical, mental, and emotional strains of working through the pandemic and
the tense political climate of 2020.

###  3.1 Research-Related Changes

With lockdowns beginning in March in the U.S., the NAC program had short
notice to make the necessary safety changes. One major challenge was
redesigning the program to accommodate the living situations of the students
as the world moved into quarantine. Typically, students spend the summer in
the city of their research site, which gives them the opportunity to connect
with their cohorts and experience the local area. This year, none of the NAC
partner sites were able to accept students in person. Because of international
travel restrictions, one student in particular was not able to get back to the
U.S. for the summer, and the international time zone difference ultimately
affected their ability to participate in the summer research experience with
the NAC. In addition, nearly half of the alumni (48% out of 44) reported a
change in their housing situation in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 34%
lived at home with family, while nearly 56% lived on or near their university
campus during the 2020-2021 academic year. Prior to the start of the summer,
each student was asked what their individual living situation would be for the
duration of the research program. Understanding each student’s circumstances
ensured we could address logistical and technological needs beforehand. Each
student-mentor pair developed a communication and research plan independently,
so that each student’s unique schedule could be worked around as needed.

According to the Alumni Survey, 9 out of 39 students reported that they did
not have access to the technologies they needed to study or do school-related
work during the 2020 semesters. In preparation for the shift to all-remote,
the NAC communicated with each student to ensure they had the technological
resources required to participate in the all-virtual platform. We installed
necessary software and shipped laptops and electronic accessories to students’
summer residences. We also hosted virtual Python coding boot camps every other
week to help our students learn the skills necessary to do their research. The
NAC Alumni Survey conducted in the fall reflects the importance of these
programs: the ability to use computer software such as MATLAB or Python and to
analyze data were ranked the most helpful skills students learned in
preparation for graduate school and other research experiences.

An important feature of the NAC summer research program is the opportunity to
engage in weekly professional development meetings and exercises. In the past,
each site’s students would meet in-person weekly, and then the full cohort
from all sites would meet virtually a few times throughout the summer. During
the pandemic we were able to continue providing these opportunities virtually
and extend them to the entire cohort weekly. With the loss of in-person
connections, having the full cohort meet weekly enhanced the sense of
community by providing shared experiences. This year, our events included
creating CVs and personal statements, a career/graduate student panel, and
talks about science communication, social media presence, and imposter
syndrome and how to tackle it.

###  3.2 Personal Accommodations

Our program recognizes that this is a stressful time that we are asking
students to work through. Vindegaard & Eriksen Benros (2020) found that
patients with preexisting psychiatric disorders reported worsening psychiatric
symptoms as a result of the pandemic, and a decrease in psychological well-
being was observed in the general public overall. These pandemic-related
stressors were compounded by other sources of trauma that arose throughout
2020, including the murder of George Floyd and the ensuing Black Lives Matter
protests for racial justice, and the tense political atmosphere of the 2020
U.S. elections. It is vital to address the students’ mental health in order to
ensure students had the support they needed to thrive both personally and
academically. We therefore enlisted a mental health provider to hold sessions
on stress reduction and coping strategies and to be a resource for overwhelmed
students. Many students attended the weekly session as well as scheduled
individual appointments with the counselor. This initiative proved to be
helpful, and we plan to continue offering access to a mental health provider
even after we move away from the virtual setting.

The NAC also recognizes the importance of the interpersonal support systems
students build with others in their cohort. In previous years, individual
cohorts for all seven sites met separately for weekly check-ins and
professional development. Moving to an all-virtual platform gave us the
opportunity to bring all the cohorts together for weekly check in-meetings to
help build the sense of camaraderie and community, even as many students were
confined to isolation. The students were also offered fun activities to take
their minds off work, such as murder mystery nights, an escape room, dinners
via Zoom, and a riddle night. Later, during the semester, we also held study
sessions and occasional catch-up sessions to continue cohort interaction. The
NAC Alumni Survey reflects the impact of these efforts: every student response
noted that support from peers made the respondent feel more comfortable in
STEM, despite the fact that 35% (out of 43 respondents) reported rarely
encountering career scientists of a similar race or ethnicity, and more than
one-quarter report only occasionally (or less often) encountering career
scientists of the same gender.

##  4 NAC Conference

As the pandemic dragged on, the annual NAC conference also needed to shift to
a virtual format to maintain safety and comply with travel restrictions.
However, unlike with the summer research experience, the NAC had several
months to prepare. Given the new format, the NAC wanted to take advantage of
opportunities that would not be possible during our traditional in-person
conference. A virtual conference format would lose in-person benefits such as
formal networking, casual interactions, and the dedicated time allocation.
However, new opportunities such as the ability to invite distant speakers and
reallocate savings from travel and accommodation costs to other endeavours
were now possible. The NAC focused its restructuring of the conference around
the students’ new needs and challenges during the pandemic. All alumni were
given an opportunity to design the conference or put forth suggestions for
this reimagined virtual conference. Ultimately, nine alumni volunteered to be
on the Organizing Committee (OC) and three of those volunteered to serve as
the committee Co-chairs. The authors of this paper were all members of the OC,
and one was a Co-chair. The NAC offered a modest stipend in exchange for their
time and efforts, and to ease student financial burdens resulting from the
pandemic.

NAC alumni that joined the conference as organizers or participants received
both direct and indirect benefits from the first virtual conference. OC
students improved their leadership and organizational skills through
exercising authority over the conference content and structure. By giving
students a voice in the decision making process, the NAC provided a powerful
platform for them to enact their ideas and foster student representation.
Post-conference, OC members all expressed that the experience gave them
valuable insight on event planning and allowed them to improve their
management, teamwork, and other soft skills. Alumni participation increased
for the virtual conference, as we had 16 alumni registrants compared to the
2019 in-person conference with 9 alumni registrants. This resulted in a larger
audience for general talks, more program content, greater networking
opportunities, and strengthened the community of our program. No matter their
level of involvement, students who participated in the virtual conference
garnered new knowledge and skills along with professional accomplishments
applicable to their curriculum vitaes.

Communication for a virtual conference is critical, so we created a
centralized website using Cvent software. Through the website, the organizers
could update the schedule of events, introduce themselves and speakers,
provide general information, and see expected participation levels for each
session. For participants, the website served as a resource with information
about events, technology platforms utilized, channels of communication for
help, and registration for individual sessions. There were no registration
fees, and the only deadline was to ensure conference supplies for specific
sessions could be shipped on time. New registrants were admitted beyond this
deadline; however, they would be responsible for supplying their own materials
as needed. The development of this website and shipment of supplies created
challenges that we further address in §5.2.

The goals of the virtual conference remained the same as the in-person
version: to give students the opportunity to present research conducted during
the summer program, engage with the community, and network. Throughout August,
the OC met weekly and planned a schedule of programming that balanced the
three main conference goals with supporting students through the struggles
they were facing during the on-going pandemic. These issues included
differences in time zones, the encroachment of individual daily
responsibilities, and the emotional and physical effects of “Zoom fatigue”
(Lee 2020). The conference was divided into two-hour long evening sessions on
Thursdays and Sundays for five weeks to approximate the 20 hours we would have
normally spent together for in-person content. This format ensured weekly
attendance would not be overly burdensome to participants, as it was limited
to a maximum of 4 hours weekly. However, choosing presentation times that
accommodated various time zones was challenging and is a point we address
later in §5.2.

The structure of each two-hour session was divided equally into two sections:
an open general session for research talks and networking events, followed by
a private session for the students with guided cohort-building activities.
This allowed us to accommodate the schedules of institutional partners by
limiting demands on their weekly time while maintaining student engagement in
a smaller and less formal setting. Students within the NAC program were
expected to attend both sections. We used one virtual platform, Zoom, for both
the public and student portions to lessen the technological demands on
participants. For consistency, one Zoom link was used for all of the general
sessions, while all cohort building sessions used another Zoom link throughout
the conference. We also maintained consistent start times across the weeks to
encourage timely attendance of participants.

The general sessions were open to all registrants and focused on science
talks, professional development, and formal networking. These events mirrored
the typical schedule of our in-person conference. We had fifteen students give
talks describing their summer research, two alumni research talks, four alumni
presenting professional development workshops, five invited speakers, welcome
and closing sessions by the organizing committee, formal networking events,
and a career night with various institutional representatives discussing their
career paths and potential opportunities for our students. The general
sessions were recorded for asynchronous access. Because a virtual conference
meant speaker slots could be spread over a wider time frame, there was greater
flexibility for scheduling invited speakers than an in-person conference would
provide. We believe this increased our opportunities for securing desired
speakers. However, the pandemic may have also temporarily increased many
speakers’ availability, so it is difficult to discern if this is a true
advantage a virtual conference would hold over in-person conferences once the
pandemic has ended. Even so, a virtual conference inherently removes travel
time and costs, so speakers have the potential to participate in multiple
events at different locations, and organizers can afford to invite distant
speakers who would normally not be able to attend do to their budget
constraints.

Participants who registered as students or alumni had access to private
sessions geared towards cohort building, which were particularly emphasized
this year due to the remote format. These sessions included seasonal
activities such as pumpkin painting, structured games like murder mystery and
charades, and casual conversations while coloring or visiting interesting
websites. Certain activities required supplies to be sent to attendees’
locations prior to the event, which posed a logistical challenge discussed
further in §5.2. These sessions, which provided shared experiences amongst the
students, helped to forge relationships. Private sessions also gave us the
opportunity to address the ongoing struggles of the pandemic and the tense
social and political climate in the US. We held appropriately timed counseling
sessions, and every meeting was a safe space to discuss school, life, and
pandemic stress among peers. Due to the nature of the conversations and
informal setting we wished to cultivate, cohort building sessions were not
recorded, so attendance was crucial. To alleviate some of the time demand,
incentivize participation, and address pandemic-related food insecurity (Laska
2020), we also offered ‘Sunday dinner’ meal gift cards to students registered
for Sunday events. Our registered student participation and engagement
remained consistent throughout the conference, but our Zoom attendance records
show that there was notably higher participation among students for Sunday
sessions.

##  5 Challenges & Recommendations

The COVID-19 global pandemic posed new challenges and amplified existing ones.
In the following subsections we identify these challenges, evaluate our
responses, and offer recommendations to improve results. We summarize these
recommendations in §6. The brief timeline between the declaration of the
pandemic and the start of our summer program meant we faced many urgent
logistical challenges, and our initial focus was to facilitate participation.
Once the ability to participate was managed, we shifted to address the
amplified emotional, physical, and financial needs of our students. This shift
in focus carried into our annual NAC conference as the academic community grew
accustomed to virtual formats. Unlike the summer research experience, we had
sufficient advance notice to contemplate the different logistics of a virtual
conference. Overall, for both summer and fall programming the methods of
communication and the differences in participants’ physical locations were the
most important factors for consideration. Transitioning from in-person to
fully-remote translates to a shift in focus from centering programming to
centering the participants’ needs. We can no longer expect participants to
adjust to our programming schedule; rather, we must build attractive
programming that can also conform to participants’ lives.

###  5.1 Summer Research Experience

The move to an all-virtual format for summer research posed several obstacles,
including technology issues (lack of computers or reliable internet), new work
environments (which were not always optimal), difficulty working with mentors
from afar via Zoom, and the struggle to build cohort communities. To rectify
these issues, we discuss changes implemented to move to a virtual summer
research experience and recommendations for specific issues.

_Student Housing_ : Due to travel restrictions, students were not able to
travel to their cohort site, nor were they able to room with cohort students
as they typically would have. This poses two main issues. First and foremost,
the sudden switch to a virtual summer research program introduced a lack of
housing security for the summer. With the program moving online, some students
had to re-evaluate their summer plans and find new housing options given their
unique circumstances. Second, because students did not see each other face-to-
face or even outside our weekly meetings, friendships were more difficult to
form. Informal after-hours interactions are vital to building a strong,
supportive community amongst the students, which is a core tenet of the NAC
model. Our recommendation is to continue to bring students together to a
cohort site and to house students together as soon as it is safe. This allows
students to experience a new city, meet students from the program, and
guarantee housing for the summer.

_Student Finances_ : Financial security is a well known issue for many
students. Typical summer research programs run from 8-12 weeks. For some,
there are periods of time when students will not be earning an income due to a
late start and/or early finish to their program. Because of this, students
have to stretch their summer stipend to make up for the difference.
Additionally, students are sometimes expected to front the money for travel to
their site before they are even paid their first stipend. To address these
financial issues, which often have a greater effect on marginalized
communities (Parker et al. 2020, Yaphet et al. 2020), we offer two possible
suggestions. First, offer to extend the internship for the entire duration of
the summer for students who desire the extra financial support and research
time. Second, we suggest making it a high priority to have travel expenses
paid directly from the summer research institution (as is standard NAC
practice) rather than having students organize their travel and pay the money
upfront.

_Mentorship_ : While we know support and mentoring from advisors and peers is
critical, the pandemic reiterated its importance. A multi-faceted support
system should be implemented for post-pandemic summers, but especially for a
virtual summer. One change the NAC plans to implement next year to build
relationships with both primary and community mentors is to introduce informal
“science tea” gatherings with small presentations given by mentors. These
presentations could be about their research, their career paths, or other
topics. Informal sessions like these help to de-emphasize the hierarchy of the
advisor-student relationship. Furthermore, building relationships with a wider
community of career researchers opens doors for students to increased
opportunities for mentorship. We recommend the addition of “intermediate
mentors” who are more senior students or junior scientists and whom summer
students may feel more comfortable coming to for help or advice. This fosters
peer-mentoring and community support, which is an important aspect
contributing to a student’s growth in the field. For the NAC, this would
include previous alumni of the program. For other programs that don’t have
alumni as a resource, such as programs run by universities or observatories,
the host institution could offer modest stipends to graduate students or
junior scientists to participate.

_Engagement_ : Because of the challenging times the students faced this
summer, we had to work more deliberately to keep the students engaged. We
present two recommendations here for helping address engagement. First, we
recommend a pre- and post-summer survey to gauge what students want, expect,
and the overall effectiveness of the program. Mid-summer evaluations are also
helpful because they allow for more immediate adjustments to better suit the
students’ needs as they arise. Additionally, we recommend keeping track of
attendance, to 1) ensure that students are doing fine overall and 2) gauge
participation and interest in specific topics amongst the group, which may be
used to plan for future sessions.

_Communication_ : The majority of communication between students, mentors, and
administrators was via email during this summer. While a Slack channel was set
up for students to ask questions and relay information, it was not utilized
very heavily. We recommend choosing one platform for meetings (i.e. Zoom,
Google Meets, Skype) and one platform for official communication (i.e. Slack,
Discord). We also supported students incorporating social media and other
platforms for informal communication and science outreach. We brought in
speakers to address Education and Public Outreach (EPO) in a virtual setting
and both personal and professional social media presence. With much of our
lives being confined to the internet, students are looking for new ways to
stay involved, and the use of social media is important to this involvement.

_Emotional Support_ : This past summer, we emphasized the importance of
addressing imposter syndrome directly and frequently. Many of us struggle with
imposter syndrome, including a reported 93% of NAC students based on survey
results, but it is often considered taboo to discuss in social settings
(Gardner et al. 2019, Jaremka et al. 2020). Imposter syndrome is a significant
topic in academic settings, and addressing it early in a student’s career will
help them as a student, scientist, and person. We advise at least one formal
discussion about imposter syndrome, preferably led by an invited specialist,
as well as multiple informal discussions regarding personal struggles amongst
the students and mentors. Furthermore, students may benefit from access to
one-on-one counselling (which we provided this year and will continue to
provide in the future). We recommend that institutions provide students with
similar access, if possible.

###  5.2 NAC Conference

Overall, the NAC program’s first transition to a fully-virtual conference was
challenging but mostly successful. The obstacles this shift introduced can be
broken into three main categories: scheduling, event supplies planning, and
website creation. Here we discuss the choices we made and the changes we would
recommend for a smoother virtual event.

_Scheduling_ : A significant concern while planning the virtual conference was
setting a reasonable and consistent event schedule that took into
consideration both the time zones of all participants, which included
locations as distant as India and Hawai’i, and other daily obligations of the
participants. We decided to host activities from 6 to 8 PM Eastern Standard
Time over the course of five weeks, since most attendees were located across
the mainland US. To address the farther time zones, we instituted programming
on weekends as well. Our approach of static meeting days and start times
throughout the weeks was intended to provide participants with a consistent
meeting pattern to avoid absences. However, this resulted in consistently
inconvenient overnight or early morning hours for our farthest participants.
Recorded sessions ensured the general talks were available asynchronously, but
there was no recorded option for cohort-building activities. In the future, to
ensure events are accessible to all participants, we suggest alternating
meeting times between mornings and afternoons or offering the same events
across multiple days if possible. In addition, the five week duration of the
conference became minorly taxing. Though attendance remained consistent
throughout the consecutive weeks, there was an emotional toll commonly
expressed in the later weeks. For future virtual conferences, we recommend
limiting the overall duration to a maximum of three weeks.

_Event Supplies Planning_ : Another concern was ensuring that all materials
required for cohort-building events were shipped to students and alumni in
time. While there was no registration deadline for the conference as a whole,
we instituted a deadline for these events so that we could have an accurate
account of how many packages were needed and where they would be shipped.
Events requiring special supplies were scheduled toward the end of the five
week conference to allow ample shipping time. For future events, we recommend
that organizers determine if supplies would be helpful to their program goals
as early as possible and prioritize the planning of those events first.

_Website Creation_ : The creation of a conference website was challenging to
the organizing committee due to a lack of experience with website development
software. The content of the website, including the master schedule and
session descriptions, had to be generated by the committee prior to the
opening of registration. A subcommittee was tasked with learning the software
and testing user interactions to ensure smooth registration once the site was
live. The additional work of learning new software and writing content
descriptions was initially underappreciated, so we recommend this is begun at
the earliest stage of planning possible.

While there are many challenges, a benefit to the remote format of both our
summer research experience and the virtual conference is that it introduced
the possibility of engagement by students and others who may otherwise be left
out of summer opportunities due to personal, financial, or medical reasons.
Virtual platforms allow people to work from anywhere, simultaneously or
asynchronously. While our recommendations may alleviate some challenges that
pose a barrier to engagement by marginalized peoples, unique situations will
still arise. We recommend that programs keep a virtual option open, even
beyond the pandemic when in-person functions can resume. This may include
maintaining a license for virtual platforms (e.g. Zoom) and introducing
infrastructure for recording and archiving in-person events. Doing so will
broaden the accessibility of any program in the long-term.

##  6 Conclusions

After over a year of working through a pandemic, the U.S. (and the world) is
still navigating through unknown territory. While these recommendations come
from reflecting on the past summer and brainstorming to improve future
summers, it is not to say that all recommendations are entirely feasible for
every program. With the next round of summer research programs in their early
planning stages, programs are now more equipped to adapt their programs to
ensure the same valuable experience for students virtually. In summary, moving
forward we recommend the following:

  * •

Do not cancel summer research experiences. Virtual summer research programs
are better than none, though it is preferred that programs send students to
sites and house students together, where possible and when safe.

  * •

Identify all technological requirements (e.g. virtual platform, website, etc.)
up-front and prioritize setting these up first. Make sure all participants
have access to these resources far in advance.

  * •

Minimize the number of digital platforms/programs/applications used across all
functions. A single platform for meetings and a single platform for official
communications are sufficient in most cases.

  * •

Identify all physical materials required for events and ship them as soon as
possible. Additionally, make a list of materials and the dates they will be
used to provide to participants who miss the deadline to have materials
shipped to them.

  * •

For in-person research opportunities, provide travel funding to (and from, if
short-term) research experiences up-front, or secure travel arrangements for
students directly.

  * •

For summer opportunities, offer extended internship dates or ‘bridge stipends’
that account for more of the summer to alleviate the financial burdens of the
most vulnerable students served by the program.

  * •

Provide informal networking opportunities throughout the summer, such as
“science tea” sessions.

  * •

Institute an “intermediate” or secondary mentorship system, preferably
including graduate students or early career researchers that students may feel
comfortable turning to for support.

  * •

Provide frequent opportunities for feedback before, during, and after
internship programs so that changes may be made to center the needs of the
participants.

  * •

For partially or fully virtual conferences, schedule programming with
staggered start-times across multiple days to accommodate time zones and busy
schedules. Record non-sensitive sessions and offer repeat events.

  * •

If scheduling a conference over a long time frame, limit the total duration to
a maximum of around 3 weeks.

  * •

Emphasize the importance of emotional support in addition to professional
support. Discuss the prevalence of impostor syndrome often, and provide
students (and all members of the community) with additional avenues for
emotional support (i.e. access to counseling). Always practice compassion with
students who have fallen behind for whatever reason.

  * •

Maintain a virtual option beyond the end of the pandemic to make programs and
conferences more accessible indefinitely.

With these recommendations and the individual adaptations of each entity,
institutions may offer more engaging content to their students, provide
greater accessibility to their programs, and allow students to gain those
invaluable resources and opportunities vital for their future endeavors.

## Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Lyndele von Schill, Karen Prairie, Isabelle Marsh,
Jessica Burns, and NAC administration for their unwavering support throughout
the years, and to thank NAC alumni for their participation in and dedication
to the development of a long-term supportive community. NAC Alumni Survey
results were collected and analyzed by Meredith Graham, and we are
appreciative of all survey participants. For their work developing and
facilitating the annual fall conference, we also wish to thank our fellow
Organizing Committee members Debora Mroczek, Maryam Hami, Sinclaire Manning,
Tiffany Christian and additional Co-chairs Alia Wofford and Antonio Porras.

The NAC is made possible through the generous support of the National Radio
Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) and the National Science Foundation (NSF). The
National Radio Astronomy Observatory is a facility of the National Science
Foundation operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities,
Inc. This material is based upon work supported by the NSF under Cooperative
Agreements No. 1647375 and 1647378. Our thanks are extended for our ongoing
partnership with the National Society of Black Physicists (NSBP). We would
also like to acknowledge our current partner sites’ funding of and mentorship
during the NAC summer research program. Summer research partner sites include:
Michigan State University, NRAO Central Development Laboratory (CDL), NRAO
Headquarters, NRAO Domenici Science Operations Center (DSOC), Princeton
University, Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI), & University of
Wisconsin-Madison. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations
expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily
reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

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