Starlette Marie Sharp

Biography

Dr. Starlette M. Sharp is a scientist-educator and higher education leader whose work spans institutional strategy, organizational systems, undergraduate education, scholar development and national science and education policy. She serves as Program Director of Undergraduate Fellowships & Research at Bucknell University, where she leads university-wide efforts to strengthen the systems, partnerships and pathways that connect undergraduate research, nationally competitive fellowships and other high-impact scholarly opportunities.

Sharp's work focuses on how universities design and coordinate institutional structures that support student learning and scholarly development. She is particularly interested in institutional coordination, organizational design, resource alignment and the development of systems that connect students with research, mentoring, fellowships, advanced study and professional opportunities. Her approach considers not only individual programs and student experiences, but also the larger institutional environments in which those experiences operate.

Prior to joining Bucknell, Sharp served as Director of the Prostate Cancer Genomics Training Program at Johns Hopkins University. Her experience in national science and education policy includes serving as an Associate Program Officer with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), as a fellow with the National Science Foundation's Directorate for Biological Sciences and as an intern in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. These experiences inform her interest in the intersections among higher education, scientific workforce development, institutional policy and national science priorities.

Earlier in her career, Sharp founded and directed the Millennium Scholars Program at Penn State, where she helped build an undergraduate scholar-development model designed to prepare students for doctoral education and research careers in STEM. Across her professional roles, she has worked at the student, program, institutional and national-policy levels, providing a systems-level perspective on how universities develop scholars, align resources and create pathways into research and advanced study.

Sharp's scholarship spans biomedical science, undergraduate research and STEM education. Her more recent work examines scientific identity, mentoring, belonging and the institutional conditions that influence students' educational and professional trajectories. She is particularly interested in how organizational structures, policies and practices can strengthen undergraduate education and create more coherent pathways from initial engagement through research, graduate education and research-intensive careers.

At Bucknell, Sharp brings these areas together through an integrated approach to undergraduate research and fellowships. She views research, mentoring, fellowships and other high-impact experiences not as isolated programs, but as interconnected components of undergraduate education. Her work emphasizes building institutional capacity, strengthening coordination across organizational boundaries and creating systems that make educational and scholarly pathways more visible and navigable for students.

Areas of Expertise

• Institutional Strategy & University Systems
• Organizational Design & Institutional Coordination
• Higher Education Policy & Strategic Initiatives
• Resource Alignment & Institutional Capacity Building
• Student Development Systems & Educational Pathways
• Undergraduate Education & High-Impact Learning
• Undergraduate Research Systems & Infrastructure
• Science, STEM Education & Workforce Policy
• Scholar Development & Nationally Competitive Fellowships
• Mentoring Systems & Organizational Networks
• Graduate Education & Research Career Pathways
• Program Development, Evaluation & Continuous Improvement

Education

Ph.D., Curriculum and Instruction (Science Education)
The Pennsylvania State University

M.S., Cancer Biology
Tuskegee University

B.S., Biology
Tuskegee University

Selected Publications

Barsoum, M. J., Braun, D. C., Brownell, S. E., Morton, T. R., Russo-Tait, T., Sharp, S. M., Schinske, J. N., & Tanner, K. D. (2024). Advancing equity, inclusion, access, and justice in biology education research—An editorial introduction to the special issue. CBE—Life Sciences Education, 23(4), ed1. DOI: 10.1187/cbe.24-11-0265.

Dolan, E. L., Borrero, M., Callis-Duehl, K., Chen Musgrove, M. M., de Lima, J., Ero-Tolliver, I., Gerhart, L. M., Goodwin, E. C., Hamilton, L. R., Henry, M. A., Herrera, J., Huot, B., Kiser, S., Ko, M. E., Kravec, M. E., Lee, M., Limeri, L. B., Peffer, M. E., Pires, D., Ramirez Lugo, J. S., Sharp, S. M., & Suarez, N. A. (2020). Undergraduate Biology Education Research Gordon Research Conference: A meeting report. CBE—Life Sciences Education, 19(2), mr1. DOI: 10.1187/cbe.19-09-0188.

Sto. Domingo, M. R., Sharp, S., Freeman, A., Freeman, T., Harmon, K., Wiggs, M., Sathy, V., Panter, A. T., Oseguera, L., Sun, S., Williams, M. E., Templeton, J., Folt, C. L., Barron, E. J., Hrabowski, F. A. III, Maton, K. I., Crimmins, M., Fisher, C. R., & Summers, M. F. (2019). Replicating Meyerhoff for inclusive excellence in STEM. Science, 364(6438), 335–337. DOI: 10.1126/science.aar5540.

Cerwinka, W. H., Sharp, S. M., Boyan, B. D., Zhau, H. E., Chung, L. W. K., & Yates, C. (2012). Differentiation of human mesenchymal stem cell spheroids under microgravity conditions. Cell Regeneration, 1(1), 2. DOI: 10.1186/2045-9769-1-2.

Karna, P., Sharp, S. M., Yates, C., Prakash, S., & Aneja, R. (2009). EM011 activates a survivin-dependent apoptotic program in human non-small cell lung cancer cells. Molecular Cancer, 8, 93. DOI: 10.1186/1476-4598-8-93.