Collaborative Research: Strengthening the OOI Data Labs Community of Practice (CoP) to enhance undergraduate data literacy

海洋观测倡议(OOI)是一个由800多台海洋仪器组成的观测网络，提供可在网上免费获得的近乎实时的数据。一个由新泽西州罗格斯大学和斯托克顿大学、佛罗里达州希尔斯伯勒社区学院、纽约城市大学皇后学院和明尼苏达州卡尔顿学院科学教育资源中心的海洋教育教员组成的合作小组将使用OOI的先进技术支持课程开发和学生参与。这项工作将用开放式开放教育指数数据维护和扩大从事教学的教授的实践共同体。这些教授将参与该项目，目标是用有效的课程材料培养学生的数据素养，并扩大海洋数据科学和数据分析方面的劳动力能力。参与者的招聘将集中在来自两年制大学、地区性四年制大学和少数族裔服务机构的教师，这些机构的学生群体包括更多的第一代学生、退伍军人、非传统学生和/或来自历史上被边缘化的社区的学生。该项目将为教授提供有针对性的职业发展机会，使他们成为OOI资产(如新设立的先锋阵列)和数据流的更专业用户，同时增加本科生对海洋学核心概念的参与和理解。通过这些专业发展机会，该项目将使一个本科教师社区能够教授海洋学，同时利用OOI数据资产发展学生的数据技能。该项目将通过提供有针对性的教师专业发展来促进海洋素养和数据技能的学习，并扩大将OOI数据纳入本科地球科学课程的教育资源，从而促进现有的OOI海洋数据实验室计划模式。对社区需求的评估将为其他相关内容的开发提供信息，这些内容可以使用OOI资产来表达和教授。数据实验室在线资源提供脚手架活动，包括指导如何定位和解释来自OOI的数据的分步指导，这些指导与海洋学的基本原则有关。这些活动通过将信息放入相关上下文中、在整个活动中自我检查知识以及促进自我发现来满足用户的需求，以支持将受益于更多数学或数据技能练习的本科生，以及为更高层次的学习目标做好准备的学生。这个项目还将扩大OOI教育资源的集合，通过让社区参与开发新的活动和新的基于Python的结构化活动，介绍技术技能，并进一步提高学习海洋概念的学生的数据素养。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Ocean Observing Initiative (OOI) is an observational network of over eight hundred ocean instruments providing near real-time data that is freely available online. A collaborative group of ocean education faculty from Rutgers University and Stockton University in New Jersey, Hillsborough Community College in Florida, and City University of New York Queens College and the Science Education Resources Center at Carleton College in Minnesota will support curriculum development and student engagement using advanced technologies of the OOI. The work will maintain and extend the Community of Practice of professors engaged in teaching with OOI data. These professors will be engaged in the project with the goal of building data literacy in students with effective course materials and expanding the workforce capacity in ocean data science and data analytics. Recruitment of participants will focus on faculty from two-year colleges, regional four-year colleges, and minority serving institutions, whose student populations include greater numbers of students who are first-generation, veterans, non-traditional, and/or from historically marginalized communities. The project will provide targeted professional development opportunities for professors to become more expert users of OOI assets, such as the newly located Pioneer Array, and data streams while increasing undergraduates’ engagement and understanding of core concepts in oceanography. Through these professional development opportunities, the project will empower a community of undergraduate instructors to teach oceanography while developing students’ data skills using OOI data assets.The project will advance the existing OOI Ocean Data Labs program model by providing targeted faculty professional development to promote learning of ocean literacy and data skills and expand educational resources that bring OOI data into undergraduate geoscience curriculum. An assessment of community needs will inform the development of additional relevant content, that can be articulated and taught using OOI assets. The Data Labs online resources provide scaffolded activities involving guided step-by-step instructions on how to orient and interpret data from the OOI that are tied to fundamental principles in oceanography. The activities meet users’ needs by placing information into relevant context, self-checking knowledge throughout the activities and promoting self-directed discovery to support undergraduate students that would benefit from more practice with math or data skills and well as students who are ready for higher order learning objectives. This project will also expand the collection of OOI educational resources, by engaging the community in the development of new activities and new Python-based structured activities that introduce technical skills and further the data literacy of students learning oceanographic concepts.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.