Collaborative Research: Institutional and Community Transformation for Teaching and Learning Quantitative Reasoning in the Biological Sciences

合作研究：生物科学定量推理教学的机构和社区转型

• 批准号: 1821179
• 负责人: Lance Bowen
• 金额: $ 25万
• 依托单位: Anne Arundel Community College
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-10-01 至 2023-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1821179&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Institutional; Community; Transformation

Quantitative reasoning (QR) involves the use of mathematical skills, such as algebra and statistical analysis, to understand and interpret data. The field of biology has become increasingly reliant on the use of quantitative reasoning to interpret large datasets, such as those gathered in genomic analysis and population studies. This project is designed to improve quantitative reasoning skills in students at community colleges preparing to transfer into biology majors at four-year institutions. These students are often underprepared to successfully complete biology majors and to continue to graduate education or to enter the STEM workforce. To achieve long-term gains in students' abilities to apply QR in biological contexts, this proposal seeks to leverage a university/community college partnership to expand and deepen the QR content in core biology courses across the major. The program aspires to provide a model for how consortia of community colleges and universities can facilitate course awareness and alignment to improve student gains in QR. This project will test the hypothesis that this type of collaboration enhances pedagogy and transfer student success at four-year institutions. Further, repeated interaction with QR modules within the core biology curricula are hypothesized to positively impact the success of all students in upper-level coursework. These efforts are designed to strengthen the course performance measures of all students, including both direct entry and transfer students. Improving student success and retention in STEM majors such as biology supports the goal of improving access of all students to scientific and technical careers.The focus of the project will be on enhancing the QR skills of undergraduates through the creation of active learning modules focused on quantitative skill development, verified with validated assessment instruments. Three scholarly communities will be established: 1) a Curricular Alignment Team, which will review curricula in four core courses (Introductory Biology: Cells and Molecules, Introductory Biology: Ecology and Evolution, Genetics, and Cell Biology) at the community colleges and the four-year institution in the collaboration, and identify areas for action, with emphasis on the development of QR abilities in biology majors; 2) the NEXUS Institute in Quantitative Biology, which will involve teams of faculty from each institution developing, piloting, and assessing QR modules for the core biology curricula and assessing the impact on student performance and retention; and 3) a Faculty Development Community, which will involve a series of shared faculty development workshops on evidence-based teaching approaches, to include the use of the created QR modules, and a common teaching certificate program. These three communities will come together annually at a regional symposium, where the consortium products (QR modules) and findings (student assessment data) will be disseminated. Taken together, this work will shape intra- and inter-institutional perspectives and practices relating to the importance of QR in the success of undergraduate biology majors. By developing faculty collaborations through the scholarly communities described above, this project will provide training in modern pedagogical methods and module development for biology faculty at community colleges and four-year institutions. The project will map the processes involved and disseminate the project findings widely to ensure that it serves as a model for other institutions that wish to take this approach to improve transfer student success and better prepare all biology majors for the modern STEM workforce.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

定量推理（QR）涉及使用数学技能，如代数和统计分析，以理解和解释数据。生物学领域越来越依赖于使用定量推理来解释大型数据集，例如基因组分析和人口研究中收集的数据集。这个项目旨在提高社区大学准备转入四年制大学生物专业的学生的定量推理能力。这些学生通常没有准备好成功完成生物学专业，继续研究生教育或进入STEM劳动力市场。为了长期提高学生在生物学背景下应用QR的能力，本提案寻求利用大学/社区学院的合作伙伴关系，在整个专业的核心生物学课程中扩展和深化QR内容。该计划旨在为社区学院和大学联盟如何促进课程意识和一致性提供一个模式，以提高学生在QR中的收益。这个项目将测试这样一个假设，即这种类型的合作可以提高四年制大学的教学方法和转校生的成功率。此外，在核心生物学课程中与QR模块的反复互动假设对所有学生在高级课程中的成功产生积极影响。这些努力旨在加强所有学生的课程表现，包括直接入学和转学生。提高学生在STEM专业（如生物学）的成功率和保留率，有助于提高所有学生进入科学和技术职业的机会。该项目的重点是通过创建以定量技能发展为重点的主动学习模块，并采用有效的评估工具进行验证，以提高大学生的QR技能。将建立三个学术团体：1)课程调整小组，负责审查社区大学和合作四年制大学的四门核心课程（生物学导论：细胞与分子、生物学导论：生态学与进化、遗传学和细胞生物学）的课程，并确定行动领域，重点是发展生物学专业的QR能力；2) NEXUS定量生物学研究所，将由每所院校的教师组成团队，为核心生物学课程开发、试点和评估QR模块，并评估对学生成绩和保留率的影响；3)教师发展社区，这将涉及一系列关于循证教学方法的共享教师发展研讨会，包括使用创建的QR模块和一个共同的教学证书计划。这三个社区将每年在一个区域研讨会上聚集在一起，在那里将传播联盟的产品（QR模块）和研究结果（学生评估数据）。综上所述，这项工作将塑造有关QR对生物学本科专业成功的重要性的内部和机构间的观点和实践。通过上述学术团体发展教师合作，该项目将为社区学院和四年制大学的生物学教师提供现代教学方法和模块开发方面的培训。该项目将绘制所涉及的过程，并广泛传播项目发现，以确保它成为其他希望采用这种方法提高转学生成功率的机构的典范，并为所有生物学专业的学生更好地为现代STEM劳动力做好准备。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。