Connecting Undergraduates to Biodiversity Instruction through Citizen Science

该项目旨在通过建立支持积极参与现实世界科学研究的教学实践来服务于国家利益，以提高学生在科学领域的保留率。社区参与正式的科学研究，或公民科学，具有巨大的潜力，是一个变革性的社会创新，为本科科学教育和学习。参与公民科学项目的学生是他们学习的积极伙伴，使他们更深入地了解科学对社区的重要性，并增加他们在科学领域保持职业道路的可能性。将公民科学相关课程带给本科生的一个主要障碍是教师缺乏将其科学专业知识转化为充分吸引学生的课堂活动所需的教育培训。这项工作将消除这一障碍，在马萨诸塞州南海岸地区的不同机构之间建立一个教师社区，共同开发公民科学项目，监测他们如何执行项目，并评估对学生的影响。利用与生物多样性和气候变化有关的公民科学项目，该项目将测试一种模式，以了解如何将教师参与者从传统的讲座转变为学生积极参与现实世界的数据收集和分析，从而制定一个蓝图，将公民科学为基础的本科课程扩展到该国其他地区和其他科学学科领域。因此，除了在区域范围内提高本科科学保留率方面取得巨大飞跃外，该项目的新教育方法将为旨在保护和恢复受人为环境变化威胁的本地生物多样性的科学研究工作做出重大贡献。研究表明，涉及积极参与现实世界科学探索的教学创新提高了本科生的态度，成就和保留。然而，大多数科学教师，虽然在他们的学科内容专家，往往缺乏必要的教学培训，将他们的科学专业知识转化为课程，充分吸引他们的学生。该项目的目标是通过将社区为基础的或“公民”的科学纳入他们的本科课堂，为大学科学教师提供这种类型的支持。实现这一目标的手段将是一系列的专业发展研讨会（夏季学院），来自马萨诸塞州南海岸地区的教师将聚集在一起，学习如何创建，促进和维护生物多样性和气候为重点的公民科学项目在他们的本科课程。通过为教师提供工具，从传统的讲座形式转变为学生积极参与现实世界的数据收集和分析，该项目预计将在区域范围内大幅提高学生的保留率。该项目将通过一个研究计划进行全面记录，该计划通过混合方法设计来调查该项目的转型性质。它包括严格的评估和经验丰富的咨询委员会。在这个项目中收集的教育数据将被用来阐明最好的方法，以发展社会科学问题为基础的公民科学项目，并展示一种手段，以提高保留在科学。这些项目将由PI团队通过Kaput STEM教育研究创新中心进行协调和支持，该中心拥有广泛协调和传播所需的基础设施和专业知识，将公众与科学家联系起来。NSF IUSE：EDU计划支持研究和开发项目，以提高所有学生STEM教育的有效性。该奖项反映了NSF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。

This project aims to serve the national interest by establishing teaching practices that support active engagement with real-world scientific research to increase student retention in the sciences. Community participation in formal scientific research, or citizen science, has tremendous potential to be a transformative social innovation for undergraduate science education and learning. Students engaged with citizen science projects are active partners in their learning, providing them with a deeper understanding of the importance of science to the community and increasing the likelihood that they will maintain a career path in the sciences. One major obstacle to bringing citizen science-related curriculum to undergraduates is that faculty lack the educational training needed to translate their scientific expertise into classroom activities that fully engage students. This work will remove this obstacle by creating a community of faculty among diverse institutions in the South Coast region of Massachusetts that will work together to develop citizen science projects, monitor how they execute their projects, and assess the impacts on their students. Using citizen science projects related to biodiversity and climate change, this project will test a model for how to shift faculty participants from traditional lecture to active involvement of students in real-world data collection and analysis, resulting in the development of a blueprint for expanding citizen science-based undergraduate curriculum to other regions of the country and to other scientific subject areas. Thus, in addition to making a quantum leap in improving retention in undergraduate science at a regional scale, this project’s novel educational approach will make a significant contribution to scientific research efforts aimed at conserving and restoring native biodiversity threatened by human-induced environmental change. Research has shown that teaching innovations that involve active participation in real-world science exploration improves undergraduate student attitudes, achievement, and retention. Yet, most science faculty, while content experts in their discipline, often lack pedagogical training needed to translate their scientific expertise into curriculum that fully engages their students. The goal of this project is to provide this type of support for college science faculty through the incorporation of community-based or ‘citizen’ science into their undergraduate classrooms. The means to accomplish this goal will be a series of professional development workshops (Summer Institutes) where faculty from the South Coast region of Massachusetts will gather to learn how to create, contribute to, and maintain biodiversity- and climate-focused citizen science projects in their undergraduate courses. By providing the tools for faculty to shift from a traditional lecture format to the active involvement of students in real-world data collection and analysis, this project expects to effect a substantial increase in student retention at a regional scale. This project will be thoroughly documented by a research plan that investigates the transformational nature of the project through a mixed methods design. It includes rigorous assessment and an experienced advisory board. Educational data collected in this project will be used to elucidate the best methods to develop socio-scientific issues-based citizen science projects and demonstrate a means to improve retention in science. The projects will be coordinated and supported by the PI team through the Kaput Center for Research & Innovation in STEM Education which has the infrastructure and expertise needed for widespread coordination and dissemination to connect the public with scientists. The NSF IUSE: EDU Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students. Through its Engaged Student Learning track, the program supports the creation, exploration, and implementation of promising practices and tools.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.