Groundwater Contamination in the Northeast: Improving STEM Education By Demonstrating How Science Matters

2014年，在纽约州胡塞克福尔斯村的公共饮用水中发现了化学物质全氟辛酸(C8或PFOA)。随着对这一发现的担忧加剧，其他社区开始检测他们的水中是否有全氟辛烷磺酸。截至2016年10月，在伊格尔桥和纽约州彼得斯堡、NH的梅里马克以及北本宁顿的本宁顿和佛蒙特州的鲍纳尔的地下水中发现全氟辛酸的浓度不安全。作为回应，本宁顿学院和联合学院的精选理科课程将在这次正在展开的污染事件中进行重新设计。在这些课程中，本科生将接受化学、地质学和环境研究方面的培训，并准备应用这些培训来实时产生关于灾难的独立数据。该项目将制定新的课程和教学模式，旨在将当地环境问题纳入科学课程，以及评估这样做的教育影响的新方法。该项目产生的教育数据有望为本宁顿学院和联合学院现有的科学课程提供信息和改进，并提供关于STEM教育在更广泛的文科校园中起作用的见解。该项目还将产生关于地下水和区域土壤中全氟辛烷磺酸水平变化的关键数据，这些数据将提供急需的污染羽流的独立特征。因此，这个项目将向不同的本科生和当地社区展示科学教育的公民价值。这个项目的指导性教育研究问题是：如何对地方公共危机进行环境研究，以提高本科生的STEM课程？具体地说，该项目将考察在环境化学和水文地质学方面对学生进行培训，并使他们能够应用这些基于学科的技能，以帮助产生关于当地危机的关键数据，这将如何影响STEM领域的学生入学、流利性、保留率和职业定位。研究人员假设，在有意义的环境研究中的实践经验将证明STEM领域在文科教育中的价值，并提高STEM中对STEM和非STEM专业的学生的结果。为了评估这一假设，这个项目将产生关于学生在化学、地质学和环境研究方面的态度和能力的变化的数据，同时这些学生参与关于附近水污染问题的环境研究。教育评估学者将与项目人员合作，为该项目校准经过验证的教育评估工具。这些评估工具包括：对特定学科知识的前后评估，旨在衡量学生对科学的信念和理解的非正式科学评估工具(ATIS)中的反思提示，以及课堂本科生研究经验(CURE)调查。该项目还将开发一个自反式评估基础设施，旨在监测这些班级学生的整个学习经历，并将初步调查结果纳入该项目的整体教学方法。总之，这些教育评估工具和方法将使我们能够通过实际应用和考试，以及通过调查、课堂讨论和反思性写作练习中的自我评估，来评估学生对学科概念和技能的掌握情况。

In 2014, the chemical Perfluorooctanoic Acid (C8 or PFOA) was discovered in the public drinking water in the Village of Hoosick Falls, NY. As concern over this discovery grew, other communities began testing their water for PFOA. As of October 2016, PFOA has been discovered in unsafe concentrations in the groundwater of Eagle Bridge and Petersburgh, NY, Merrimack, NH, and in Bennington, North Bennington, and Pownal, VT. In response, select science courses at Bennington College and Union College will be redesigned in conversation with this unfolding contamination event. In these courses, undergraduate students will be trained in chemistry, geology, and environmental studies and equipped to apply that training in the production of independent data on a disaster in real-time. The project will craft new curriculum and teaching modules aimed at incorporating local environmental problems into science curriculum, as well as new methods for assessing the educational impact of doing so. The educational data produced by this project promises to inform and improve existing science curriculum at Bennington College and Union College as well as offer insights about what works in STEM education on a liberal arts campus more generally. This project will also produce key data on changing levels of PFOA in groundwater and regional soils that will provide a much-needed independent characterization of the contamination plume. This project, then, will showcase the civic value of an education in science for diverse undergraduate students and the local community.The guiding educational research question of this project is: How can environmental research on a local public crisis enhance the STEM curriculum for undergraduate students? Specifically, this project willexamine how training students in environmental chemistry and hydrogeology and equipping them to apply those discipline-based skills to help produce key data on a local crisis will influence student enrollment, fluency, retention, and vocational orientation in STEM fields. The researchers hypothesize that hands-on experience in meaningful environmental research will demonstrate the value of STEM fields in a liberal arts education and enhance student outcomes within STEM for both STEM and non-STEM majors. To evaluate this hypothesis, this project will produce data on changes in student attitudes towards and aptitude in chemistry, geology, and environmental studies while those students participate in environmental research on a nearby water contamination issue. Education assessment scholars will collaborate with project personnel to calibrate proven education assessment tools to this project. These evaluation tools include: pre- and post- assessments of discipline-specific knowledge, reflective prompts in Assessment Tools in Informal Science (ATIS) geared towards measuring students' beliefs about and understandings of science, and the Classroom Undergraduate Research Experience (CURE) survey. This project will also develop a reflexive infrastructure of assessment designed to monitor the entire learning experience of students in these classes and incorporate preliminary findings into the overall pedagogy of the project. Together, these education assessment tools and methods will enable us to evaluate students' mastery of disciplinary concepts and skills through practical application and exams as well as through self-assessments embedded in surveys, class discussions, and reflective writing exercises.