BIORETS: Genetics and Genomics Research Experiences for High School Teachers in the Greater Houston Area

休斯顿遗传学BIORETS计划将为休斯顿大学的高中生物学教师提供遗传学和基因组学方面的夏季研究经验。遗传学是高中生物课程的核心主题，也是生物学中许多其他主题的基础。遗传知识对于理解生物医学、农业和环境科学也至关重要。尽管遗传学具有核心重要性，但对遗传学的理解始终落后于其他科学概念，遗传学和基因组学在现代生物学中发挥的作用越来越大。休斯顿遗传学BIORETS计划将通过为高中生物教师提供宝贵的知识和经验来解决这个问题，这些知识和经验将改善课堂上的遗传学教学。教师将从有大量高风险学生和历史上被排除在科学之外的学生群体的学校中挑选。休斯顿遗传学BIORETS计划旨在通过实现三个目标来改善高中生物课的遗传学教学。首先，教师将通过参与研究项目来提高他们的遗传学和基因组学内容知识，他们将参加有关遗传学和基因组学主题的研讨会。第二，专家教师培训员将提供有效教学实践方面的指导，包括探究式教学和文化适应性教学法。第三，教师将与遗传学教师和教师培训人员合作，开发在课堂上使用的课程材料，具体目标是提高学生对遗传学概念的理解和对遗传学职业的认识。课程计划将公布并分发给其他教师。外部项目评估员将评估每个目标的完成情况，并提供年度改进反馈。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。

The Houston Genetics BIORETS program will provide summer research experiences in genetics and genomics for high school biology teachers at the University of Houston. Genetics is a core topic in high school biology curricula, and it is foundational for many other topics in biology. Genetic literacy is also essential for understanding biomedical, agricultural, and environmental science. Despite this central importance, understanding of genetics consistently lags behind other scientific concepts, which is made even worse by the growing role that genetics and genomics plays in modern biology. The Houston Genetics BIORETS program will address this problem by providing high school biology teachers with valuable knowledge and experiences that will improve genetics instruction in their classrooms. Teachers will be drawn from schools with large enrollments of at-risk students and students from groups historically excluded from the sciences.The Houston Genetics BIORETS program aims to improve genetics instruction in high school biology classes by achieving three goals. First, teachers will improve their genetics and genomics content knowledge by participating in research projects, and they will attend seminars on topics in genetics and genomics. Second, expert teacher trainers will provide instruction in effective pedagogical practices, including inquiry-based teaching and culturally responsive pedagogy. Third, teachers will work with genetics faculty and teacher trainers to develop curricular materials to use in their classrooms, with specific objectives of improving student understanding of concepts and awareness of genetics careers. Lesson plans will be published and disseminated to other teachers. An external project evaluator will assess how well each goal was accomplished and provide annual feedback for improvement.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.