RCN-UBE Incubator: The Campus as a Living Lab

该项目旨在通过增加四年制大学和社区大学的本科生参与真实和相关的STEM研究的机会，为国家利益服务。随着原生蜜蜂校园作为生活实验室（CALL）研究工具包的发展，该项目将解决教师在此过程中经常面临的两个主要障碍，有限的时间和资源。CALL研究工具包将包括材料和逐步指导，以启动和扩大校园本地蜜蜂生物多样性的研究。所有重要信息也将以西班牙语提供。网络教师参与者将接受工具包的培训，以便他们可以在各自的校园向学生介绍生物多样性研究。有了这个易于实施和低成本的工具包，教师和学生可以把他们的校园和附近的自然区域变成研究地点。这种体验将增加学生对本地蜜蜂分布、生态学和栖息地丰富科学的知识和意识。为学生提供这种研究机会将加强学生与校园、教授和同学的联系，从而增加他们在STEM学位和职业道路上的归属感和保留感。该项目的主要目标是在社区大学和四年制大学建立一个教师网络，将本地蜜蜂生物多样性研究纳入他们的课程。该项目的主要目标包括：1)建立教师网络；2)创建、测试和完善原生蜜蜂校园生活实验室（CALL）工具包。私立学院和运营委员会的成员们将发展和扩大代表不同地理和生态地区的全国社区大学和四年制大学网络。与许多两年制学院建立一个网络，这些学院为高比例的未被充分代表的学生提供服务，将实现多个目标，其中包括增加教师分享最佳实践信息的机会，将研究经验制度化到课程中，加强学生转学到四年制大学的途径，并创造学生和教师之间合作的机会。本地蜜蜂生物多样性数据将被输入公共数据库，并在网络参与者之间共享。因此，本研究将有助于本地和全球范围内的本地蜜蜂保护。共享的数据库将使识别校园内本地蜜蜂物种组成的差距成为可能。然后可以通过有针对性的栖息地富集来填补这些空白。通过这种方式，社区大学校园内的大型景观地块最终可以作为栖息地岛和走廊。该项目由生物基础设施司生物科学理事会和本科教育司教育和人力资源理事会共同资助，作为其应对《本科生物学教育的愿景与变革：行动呼吁》（http://visionandchange/finalreport/）所提出的挑战的努力的一部分。本项目也得到了NSF HSI和IUSE: EHR项目的支持。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。

This project aims to serve the national interest by increasing opportunities for undergraduate students at four-year and community colleges to engage in authentic and relevant STEM research. With the development of a native bee Campus as a Living Lab (CALL) research toolkit, the project will address two main barriers that faculty regularly face in doing so, limited time and resources. The CALL research toolkit will include materials and step-by-step instructions to initiate and expand the study of campus native bee biodiversity. All essential information will be developed in Spanish as well. Network faculty participants will receive training with the toolkit so that they can introduce students to biodiversity research on their respective campuses. With this easy-to-implement and low-cost toolkit, faculty and students can turn their campuses and nearby natural areas into research locations. This experience will increase students’ knowledge and awareness regarding native bee distribution, ecology, and to the science of habitat enrichment. Providing students this research opportunity will enhance student’s connection to their campus, professors, and fellow students, thereby increasing their sense of belonging and retention within STEM degree and career paths. The project's primary goal is to develop a network of faculty at community colleges and four-year institutions who incorporate native bee biodiversity research into their courses. Key objectives of this project include: 1) building the network of faculty, and 2) creating, beta testing, and refining the native bee Campus As a Living Lab (CALL)Toolkit. The PIs and steering committee members will develop and expand a nationwide network of community colleges and four-year institutions, representing geographically and ecologically varied locations. Developing a network with many two-year colleges who serve a high percentage of underrepresented students will achieve multiple goals, which include increasing opportunities for faculty to share information on best practices to institutionalizing research experiences into courses, strengthening the pathway for students to transfer to four-year institutions, and generating opportunities for collaboration among students and faculty. Native bee biodiversity data will be entered into public databases and will be shared among the network participants. Therefore, this research will contribute to native bee conservation on a local and global scale. The shared data base will make it possible to identify gaps in native bee species composition on campuses. These gaps could then be filled by using targeted habitat enrichment. In this way, the large landscape parcels on community college campuses can ultimately serve as habitat islands and corridors. This project is being jointly funded by the Directorate for Biological Sciences, Division of Biological Infrastructure, and the Directorate for Education and Human Resources, Division of Undergraduate Education as part of their efforts to address the challenges posed in Vision and Change in Undergraduate Biology Education: A Call to Action (http://visionandchange/finalreport/). This project is also supported by the NSF HSI and IUSE: EHR programs.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.