A major obstacle for minority students completing graduate degrees in science and engineering is a lack of support system. The Academy of Courageous Minority Engineers (ACME), founded in 2003, is a group designed to retain and enhance the experience of minority graduate students by facilitating and supporting programming geared toward completion of graduate degrees in multiple disciplines including electrical engineering, computer science, media arts and sciences, biology, and urban studies. While support or accountability groups are not a new idea, ACME strives to make this process systematic and focused. Weekly forums are held to discuss and provide constructive feedback on the content of and progress toward research goals as well as discussion topics related to graduate school success including time management, preparing for qualifying exams, and advisor-advisee relationships.

In 2007, we published an academic paper about the aimes of our group (link).