This project will lay the framework for the development of a network to increase the use of authentic research experiences in undergraduate laboratory courses, especially at the introductory level.
Intellectual Merit: Undergraduate research has been shown to increase student understanding of scientific content, experimental design, and the nature of science, yet surveys of teaching practices show that authentic research experiences in laboratory courses are the exception, rather than the norm. We will host a planning group of interested faculty from the Council for Undergraduate Research (CUR), the Association for Biology Laboratory Education (ABLE), and other organizations to identify key issues and develop ideas for implementing authentic research experiences in introductory laboratory courses. Meeting with the Preparing to Prepare the 21st Century Biology Student network will integrate this work with other research networks in undergraduate biology education. Finally, we propose to survey biology faculty on authentic research experiences in laboratory courses to identify successful models of and common barriers to incorporating authentic research experiences in laboratory courses.
Broader Impacts: Participants in the planning group and in the survey will be recruited from a range of biology sub-disciplines, geographical regions, and institution types, including minority-serving institutions and community colleges. The work of the planning group will help develop this project into a full RCN-UBE proposal, and the findings of the survey will be published in a journal of the undergraduate STEM education community.
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.
Undergraduate research has been shown to increase student understanding of scientific content, experimental design, and the nature of science, yet surveys of teaching practices show that authentic research experiences in laboratory courses are the exception, rather than the norm. Therefore, the ultimate goal of the proposed project was to lay the framework for the development of a network to increase the use of authentic research experiences in undergraduate laboratory courses, especially at the introductory level. We developed and carried out a national survey on authentic research experiences in introductory laboratory courses. The survey had faculty define the essential components of an authentic research experience in a laboratory course. Based on their definition, faculty were asked to provide demographic information about the introductory biology laboratory courses at their institution, including the percentage of the courses devoted to authentic research, and to rank the importance of particular barriers to the implementation of authentic research. The survey was widely disseminated through email lists of the biology education community. The results of the survey suggest two separate conceptions of authentic research – one emphasizing science process skills and one emphasizing novel research questions. The majority of institutions spend less than 25% of course time on authentic research activities. Time to develop new research activities was the greatest barrier to implementation. In addition to the survey, we led two workshops on authentic research experiences in laboratory courses at the national meetings. In both workshops, we reviewed the results of our survey and presented cases studies on how faculty have incorporated authentic research into their laboratory courses. Both workshops were well attended with more than 100 faculty attending the two workshops combined. The combined work of the network will expand the use of authentic research experiences in introductory biology laboratory courses, which will help to expand the scientifically literate public and science and technology workforce.
