Collaborative Project: Expanding the use of Remotely Operable Research Instrumentation in the Classroom to Transform Undergraduate Geoscience Education

该合作项目正在研究分析仪器的远程操作，特别是佛罗里达国际大学（FIU）的扫描电子显微镜和电子显微探针分析仪，以促进以探究式学习方法为基础的本科地球科学课程。目前正在四个不同机构对不同课程水平和受众的远程仪器使用效果进行评估：佛罗里达国际大学、瓦伦西亚社区学院、佛罗里达海湾海岸大学和南佛罗里达大学。每个机构的教师都在根据自己的课程和学生调整工具的使用，并使用共同的方法来评估学习成果和学生态度的变化，沿着新手到专家的轨迹。在四个伙伴机构进行仪器使用和学习评估的同时，还在国家一级开展外联活动，以吸引更多的伙伴，为承诺在自己的课程中试点使用仪器的教师提供实践讲习班和后续个人培训和咨询。该项目的智力价值在于其精心制定的计划，利用固定位置的高端分析仪器，在偏远院校的本科课程中进行真实的研究和探究。嵌入式教育研究解决了以下重要问题：a)远程仪器辅助查询在多大程度上以及哪种类型的查询能够实现有针对性的学生学习成果；b)随着机构类型、课程水平和学生受众的变化，哪些因素决定了有效性；c)该方法的广泛传播存在哪些挑战，以及如何克服这些挑战。该项目的更广泛影响包括a)产生见解和实践，促进在本科课程的多个层面远程使用研究级分析仪器，提供一个可用于其他研究中心的模型，以使迄今为止难以获得的分析能力在广泛的本科院校；b)让各种各样的学生（从主修课程的高年级学生到一年级非主修入门课程的学生）和机构（从研究型大学到社区学院）参与真正的研究，这是一种留住STEM学科学生的高影响力实践，以及c)合作机构及其他机构的教师的专业发展，以及博士后学者和研究生从事基于学科的教育研究。

This collaborative project is examining the remote operation of analytical instruments, specifically a scanning-electron microscope and electron microprobe analyzer housed at Florida International University (FIU), to facilitate inquiry-based approaches to learning in undergraduate geoscience courses. The effectiveness of remote instrument use is being assessed across different course levels and audiences at four diverse institutions: FIU, Valencia Community College, Florida Gulf Coast University, and the University of South Florida. Faculty at each institution are adapting instrument use to their courses and students, and using common methods to assess learning gains and changes in students' attitudes along a novice-to-expert trajectory. Instrument use and learning assessment at the four partnering institutions is being supplemented by national-level outreach to engage further partners, using hands-on workshops and follow-on individual training and consultation for faculty who commit to pilot use in their own courses.The intellectual merit of the project lies in its well-formulated plan to leverage fixed-location, high-end analytical instruments to enable authentic research and inquiry within the undergraduate curriculum at remote institutions. The embedded educational research addresses important questions of a) how much and what type(s) of remote instrument-aided inquiry enable targeted student-learning outcomes, b) what factors determine effectiveness as institution type, curricular level, and student audiences vary, and c) what challenges exist for widespread propagation of the approach and how might these be overcome. Broader impacts of the project include a) the production of insights and practices that promote remote use of research-grade analytical instrumentation at multiple levels of the undergraduate curriculum, providing a model that could be used at other research centers to enable heretofore inaccessible analytical capabilities at a wide range of undergraduate institutions, b) engagement of a diverse range of students (from seniors in majors' classes to first-year non-majors in introductory classes) and institutions (from research universities to community colleges) in authentic research, a high-impact practice for retaining students in STEM disciplines, and c) professional development for faculty at the partnering institutions and beyond, as well as for a postdoctoral scholar and graduate student engaged in discipline-based educational research.