The PALM Network: Enhancing undergraduate biology education and building the professional biology educators workforce through long-term mentorships

促进主动学习和指导（PALM）研究协调网络专注于为主动学习提供持续的指导，这种实践被证明在提高不同STEM学生的成功率和保留率方面非常有效。该项目向在职教职员工和博士后开放，并由多个生命科学专业协会和一系列教育机构的教职员工协调。网络协调员将招募参与者，并提供分享他们在加强主动学习方面的成就的场所。将作出特别努力，包括少数族裔院校和社区学院的教师，因为许多得不到充分教育的学生都是从这些院校开始他们的大学生涯的。结果将是一个不断扩大的全国本科教师网络，他们实践有效的主动学习方法，从而提高本科STEM教育的质量。短期接触主动学习的原则往往不足以促进教学实践的重大变化，从讲课主导到更有效的学习形式。PALM网络的目标是提供长期的、实际的指导经验，使PALM学员能够体验到实现有效变革所需的教学和文化变革的范围，从而导致对每个PALM学员所在机构的教学文化产生积极影响的变革。PALM将利益相关者聚集在一起，支持教学指导，以促进不同机构的持续生物教育改革。PALM将允许教师和博士后获得实践经验和至少一个学期的指导，将循证有效的主动学习策略带入他们的课堂。PALM研究员将与改革了教学的导师配对，拜访他们的导师，观察和参与重新设计的课程，在导师的指导下为他们的一个班级开发一个主动学习模块，展示他们如何调整自己的实践以使用主动学习，并在他们的家庭机构、专业协会会议和同行评议的科学教育文献中传播他们的工作。对该项目的评估将包括分析PALM研究员在指导前后的教学实践，以及之后3-5年的年度跟踪调查，以确定长期影响。由来自7个生命科学专业协会的教育代表和来自不同机构的教师组成的指导委员会将监督该计划，筛选导师申请人，提供导师指导和定期跟进，并协调每年的研究员和导师信息共享会议。通过利用指导委员会与少数民族和部落服务机构、未被充分代表的科学家社团和社区学院之间的联系（这些机构教育了美国一半以上的少数民族学生），PALM将把“愿景与变革”改革带给那些在过去的教学改革计划中未被突出考虑的教师和本科生。该项目由生物科学理事会和本科教育司教育和人力资源理事会共同资助，作为其应对《本科生物学教育的愿景与变革：行动呼吁》（http://visionandchange/finalreport/）所提出的挑战的努力的一部分。

The Promoting Active Learning & Mentoring (PALM) Research Coordination Network focuses on providing sustained mentoring in active learning, a practice shown to be highly effective in increasing success and retention of diverse STEM students. The project is open to current faculty and postdoctoral fellows and is coordinated through several life sciences professional societies and faculty at a range of educational institutions. Network coordinators will recruit participants and provide venues for sharing of their achievements in enhanced active learning. Special efforts will be made to include instructors at minority-serving institutions and community colleges, where many under-served students begin their college careers. The outcome will be an expanding national network of undergraduate instructors who practice effective active learning methods, thus enhancing the quality of undergraduate STEM education. Short-term exposure to principles of active learning is often not sufficient to promote significant change in teaching practices from lecture-dominated to a more effective learning format. The goal of the PALM Network is to provide long-term, hands-on mentoring experiences that will allow PALM Fellows to experience the scope of pedagogical and cultural changes needed to achieve effective change, and thus lead to change that will positively influence the teaching culture at each PALM Fellow's institution. PALM brings together stakeholders to support teaching mentorships to promote sustained biology education reform at diverse institutions. PALM will allow faculty and postdoctoral fellows to gain hands-on experience and at least one semester of mentorship in bringing evidence-based, effective active learning strategies into their classrooms. PALM Fellows will pair with mentors who have reformed their teaching, visit their mentors to observe and participate in redesigned classes, develop an active learning module for one of their classes with guidance from their mentors, demonstrate how they have adjusted their practice to use active learning, and disseminate their work at their home institutions and at professional society meetings and in the peer-reviewed science education literature. Evaluation of the program will involve analysis of PALM Fellows' teaching practices before and after mentorship and annual follow-up surveys for 3-5 years afterwards to determine long-range impact. A Steering Committee consisting of educational representatives from seven life sciences professional societies and faculty from a variety of institutional types will oversee the program, screen applicants for mentorships, provide mentor orientation and regular follow-up, and coordinate information sharing meetings of Fellows and mentors each year. By capitalizing on Steering Committee links to minority- and tribal-serving institutions, societies of underrepresented scientists, and community colleges, which educate over half the minority students in the U.S., PALM will bring Vision and Change reforms to faculty and undergraduate students who have not factored prominently into past pedagogical reform plans. This project is being jointly funded by the Directorate for Biological Sciences and the Directorate for Education and Human Resources, Division of Undergraduate Education as part of their efforts to address the challenges posed in Vision and Change in Undergraduate Biology Education: A Call to Action (http://visionandchange/finalreport/).