The Partnership for Minority Advancement in the Biomolecular Sciences (PMABS) is an education consortium whose goal is to increase diversity in the science professions by reforming bioscience education. Over 12 years, PMABS' universities-seven historically minority universities (HMUs) and UNC-CH-have forged a collaboration that has made major inroads into transforming bioscience education and contributing to diversity in the profession. With the explosion of bioscience knowledge and new disciplines and the central role information technology (IT) now plays in effective teaching and learning and career success, PMABS is developing new initiatives to provide HMU students and faculty access to this new world of knowledge and IT. To ensure that the """"""""digital"""""""" and """"""""knowledge"""""""" divides do not become barriers to success, PMABS has created an innovative """"""""virtual"""""""" bioscience learning environment-the BioScience Sharium. The Sharium is an assembly of collaborating scientists, technologists, and students, digital instructional and IT resources, and the hardware required to connect users to resources and each other. The core of the Sharium is a distributed learning network (DLN) that enables videoconferencing communication (e.g., courses) between partner universities, ensuring that HMU students have access to essential cutting-edge scientific disciplines. The driving force for the Sharium is Ph.D. scientists trained in IT-supported education who make up PMABS' Collaborative Electronic Learning Laboratory (CELL). The CELL scientists train HMU faculty in IT applications and deliver needed courses via the DLN. The Sharium's initial successes and CELL's pivotal role have led to requests for service by HMU faculty that far exceed what CELL can provide. Therefore, PMABS is requesting to grow CELL by having a Ph.D. scientist/IT-trained educator in each HMU bioscience department to: 1) coordinate IT-supported teaching/learning; 2) teach needed courses; 3) train faculty in IT-rich teaching; 4) support student adoption of IT; 5) facilitate Sharium activities; and 6) contribute to scholarship on E-pedagogy for IT-supported teaching. Success of the scientists will depend upon their ability to facilitate the """"""""diffusion of innovation"""""""" into the teaching and learning culture of the HMU departments. To accomplish this, PMABS will take the novel approach of training the scientists to be """"""""change agents."""""""" CELL has tested this model, and its resounding success indicates that having change agents throughout the Partnership will provide a learning environment for HMU students, as well as professional development for HMU faculty, which will ensure they keep pace with the knowledge and IT revolutions. The end result of this program will be increased diversity in bioscience professions. Finally, this model has the potential of serving as a resource for other universities, who are also struggling to transform the bioscience profession.
| Novicki, Andrea (2005) Proprioception: confronting prior knowledge. Adv Physiol Educ 29:210-1 |
