Collaborative Proposal: EURO: Enhancing Undergraduate Research Opportunities

Boyer报告（Boyer Commission on Educating Undergraduates in Research Universities，“Reinventing Undergraduate Education; A Blueprint for America's Research Universities，”1998）指出了三个仍然渗透到许多公立研究型大学的挑战：需要让学生更早地开始研究活动，为更多的学生提供高质量的研究经验，并创造可以提供给越来越多的转学生的经验。第二个美国竞争法（2011年1月）敦促将本科生纳入标准NSF赠款。 然而，越来越多的参与早期本科研究仍然是一个挑战，在许多高等教育机构。该项目正在开发一种协作方法，以增加早期本科生参与重大研究活动。 这是通过旨在教授一般研究技能的课程和计划来实现的，而不仅仅是让学生参与特定的学科研究活动。 通过专注于“研究导向”或“研究技能”的经验，更多的学生可以在经济上包括在他们的本科学习早期。 该项目是一个由华盛顿州立大学、中央佛罗里达大学和亚拉巴马大学组成的伙伴关系，威斯康星大学麦迪逊分校的教员参与了咨询工作。 合作伙伴正在调整彼此现有的研究技能课程（每个机构一门，共三门）。 所有这三门课程都向每个伙伴机构的学生提供。这三种模式是：- 一个教师领导的靴子营短期课程，在夏季作为一个密集的计划运行一周（最初在WSU开发）-一个同行指导的短期课程转学学生就在学年开始之前（最初在UCF开发）-一个学期长的研讨会课程，在学年期间使用异步交付的演讲材料（最初在威斯康星州开发）。这一建议的智力价值增加了一个正在进行的，全面的评估，这些方案的有效性和成本在三所大学，由一个集中的评估小组进行。评估是解决以下问题：-这三个技能方案增加了学生参与本科研究的数量，同时保持现有经验的质量？- 技能计划是否减少了实验室新本科研究人员的“孵化期”，并增加了全校教师的参与？- 在三所公立研究型大学实施可持续研究型教学和培训模块的成本和收益是什么？ 这些信息对于考虑将本科研究项目制度化或发展本科研究项目的机构具有潜在价值。

The Boyer Report (Boyer Commission on Educating Undergraduates in Research Universities, "Reinventing Undergraduate Education; A Blueprint for America's Research Universities," 1998) identified three challenges that still permeate many public research universities: the need to start students in research activities earlier, providing quality research experiences for more students, and creating experiences that can be delivered to increasing numbers of transfer students. The second America COMPETES Act (January 2011) urged that undergraduates be included in standard NSF grants. However, increasing participation in early undergraduate research continues to be a challenge at many institutions of higher education. This project is developing a collaborative approach to increasing early undergraduate participation in significant research activities. This is being accomplished through courses and programs designed to teach general research skills, rather than only engaging students in specific disciplinary research activities. By focusing on "research oriented" or "research skills" experiences, more students can be economically included early in their undergraduate studies. The project is a partnership comprised of Washington State University, the University of Central Florida, and the University of Alabama, with faculty members from the University of Wisconsin-Madison participating in an advisory role. The partners are adapting each others' existing research skills courses (one per institution, three in total). All three courses are being made available to students at each partner institution. The three models are: - A faculty led boot camp short course, running one week in the summer as an intensive program (developed originally at WSU) - A peer mentored short course for transfer students just prior to the beginning of the academic year (developed originally at UCF) - A semester long seminar course that meets during the academic year using asynchronous delivery of lecture material (developed originally at Wisconsin). The intellectual merit of this proposal is increased by an ongoing, comprehensive assessment of the effectiveness and cost of these programs at three universities, as undertaken by a centralized evaluation team. The assessment is addressing the following questions: - Do these three skills programs increase the number of students participating in undergraduate research while maintaining the quality of existing experiences? - Do skills programs decrease the "incubation period" of new undergraduate researchers in the laboratory and increase faculty participation campus-wide? - What are the costs and benefits of implementing sustainable research-oriented teaching and training modules at three public research universities? This information is of potential value for institutions considering efforts to institutionalize or grow their undergraduate research programs.