Collaborative Research: BIO IUSE Ideas Lab: Supporting Faculty in Quantitative Undergraduate Biology Education and Synthesis (QUBES)

在美国国家科学基金会改善本科生STEM教育（IUSE）计划的资助下，该项目解决了国家日益增长的需求，即更好地为本科生生物学家提供在工作场所或研究生院取得成功所需的定量和计算技能。 将数学推理技能完全融入本科生物学课堂一直具有挑战性，部分原因是，由于许多生物学科的快速变化和学术奖励制度，往往忽视了教学的发展和研究。定量本科生物学教育和综合（QUBES）的支持教师该项目涉及五个相互依存的举措，促进整个生物科学课程的定量和计算技能的整合。该项目通过协调已经参与定量生物学教育改革的不同团体的努力和资源，在现有社区投资的基础上再接再厉。这种方法使QUBES能够扩大专业协会和专业课程项目等组织的优势，同时简化所需的沟通和协调，以扩大定量生物学（QB）改革思想的教师教育工作者的社区。指导网络将用于支持教师理解和课堂实施特定的定量生物学概念和教学策略。这些辅导网络将由具备定量和教学专门知识的小组领导，并将为在空间上分布的教员群体提供服务，这些教员群体在改革其目前的教学实践方面有着共同的兴趣。参与的教师将在自己的机构内传播资源，组织新的辅导网络，并在其专业协会中发挥领导作用。这些合作的产品将作为QUBES Hub的一部分，这是一个虚拟环境，为所有QB教育工作者提供专业支持活动和课程资源。为了应对记录教学奖学金的挑战，QUBES项目还在试行一个系统，用于描述和跟踪教师对QB教育社区的贡献。这种高风险，但潜在的变革，倡议制定有意义的教学奖学金指标可能会对不同机构类型的学术奖励制度产生长期影响。通过加强QB研究和开发工具，该项目正在丰富学科，并促进STEM教育的长期学术文化变革。最后，该合作组织正在研究和传播他们所了解的关于这一教育改革努力的有效性。这项研究将采取系统的方法来描述有效的干预措施和障碍，在影响教育改革成功的复杂因素的变化。要有效执行和管理如此复杂的项目，就需要进行彻底和持续的评价。项目团队在整个项目活动中嵌入了数据收集系统，作为一种手段，可以近乎真实的跟踪进度，有效管理资源，并在相互连接的项目组件之间保持清晰的沟通。QUBES的实施、研究和开发方法有望对全国的QB教育产生重大影响，更广泛地说，将为系统的STEM教育改革工作提供信息。该项目由生物科学局和教育和人力资源局联合资助，本科教育部支持努力应对本科教育中的愿景和变革所带来的挑战：行动呼吁http://visionandchange.org/finalreport/

With funding from the National Science Foundation's Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (IUSE) program, this project addresses the Nation's growing need to better prepare undergraduate biologists with the quantitative and computational skills needed to be successful in the workplace or in graduate school. The full integration of mathematical reasoning skills into undergraduate biology classrooms has been challenging, in part, because of the rapid pace of change in many biological disciplines and an academic reward system that often overlooks pedagogical development and research.The Supporting Faculty in Quantitative Undergraduate Biology Education and Synthesis (QUBES) project involves five interdependent initiatives that promote the integration of quantitative and computational skills across the biological sciences curriculum. The project is building on the investments of existing communities by coordinating the efforts and resources of diverse groups that are already involved in quantitative biology education reform. This approach allows QUBES to amplify the strengths of organizations like professional societies and specialized curriculum projects while streamlining the communications and coordination required to grow broader community of reform-minded faculty educators in quantitative biology (QB). Mentoring networks will be used to support faculty understanding and classroom implementation of specific quantitative biology concepts and teaching strategies. These mentoring networks will be led by teams containing both quantitative and pedagogical expertise and will serve spatially distributed groups of instructors who share a common interest in reforming their current teaching practices. Participating instructors will disseminate resources within their own institutions, organize new mentoring networks, and take leadership roles in their professional societies. The products from these collaborations will be captured as part of the QUBES Hub, a virtual environment providing professional support activities and access to curriculum resources for all QB educators. In order to address the challenges of documenting teaching scholarship, the QUBES project is also piloting a system for describing and tracking faculty contributions to the QB education community. This high-risk, but potentially transformative, initiative to develop meaningful metrics of teaching scholarship could have a long term impact on academic reward systems across diverse institution types. By strengthening QB research and development tools, the project is enriching the discipline and catalyzing long-term academic cultural change across STEM education. Finally, the collaborative is studying and disseminating what they learn about the effectiveness of this educational reform effort. This research will take a systems approach to characterize effective interventions and barriers to change within the complex landscape of factors influencing the success of educational reform. The efficient execution and management of a project with this level of complexity requires thorough and ongoing evaluation. The project team is embedding data collection systems throughout project activities as a means to track progress in near real time, manage resources effectively, and maintain clear communication across connected project components. The QUBES approach to implementation, research, and development promises to have a significant impact on QB education across the nation and, more generally, to inform systemic STEM education reform efforts.This project is funded jointly by the Directorate for Biological Sciences and the Directorate of Education and Human Resources, Division of Undergraduate Education in support of efforts to address the challenges posed in Vision and Change in Undergraduate Education: A Call to Action http://visionandchange.org/finalreport/