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Nancy H. Hensel The New American Colleges and Universities Kalyn Shea Owens & Ann Murkowski North Seattle Commun

Tapping the Potential of All Students: Integrating Undergraduate Research into the Community College Curriculum. Nancy H. Hensel The New American Colleges and Universities Kalyn Shea Owens & Ann Murkowski North Seattle Community College.

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Nancy H. Hensel The New American Colleges and Universities Kalyn Shea Owens & Ann Murkowski North Seattle Commun

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  1. Tapping the Potential of All Students: Integrating Undergraduate Research into the Community College Curriculum Nancy H. Hensel The New American Colleges and Universities Kalyn Shea Owens & Ann Murkowski North Seattle Community College TRANSFORMING STEM EDUCATION Inquiry, Innovation, Inclusion, and EvidenceSan Diego, CA October 31-November 2, 2013

  2. National ConversationsUndergraduate Research at Community Colleges Questions: • What is currently happening regarding undergraduate research at community colleges? • In what kind of research activities would community colleges like to involve undergraduates? • How could the Council on Undergraduate Research and the National Council of Instructional Administrators help community colleges realize their goals for students’ participation in undergraduate research?

  3. What We Learned Categories of Undergraduate Research at Community Colleges: • Incorporating research into the curriculum • Utilizing research activities in place of “cookbook” laboratories or assignments • Conducting applied research at community colleges • Conducting basic research at community colleges • Collaborating with four-year colleges

  4. What We Did Next • Twelve workshops • 95 campuses • 380 campus participants

  5. Undergraduate Research as an Effective Pedagogical Tool • Greater gains in learning – science/math/logic, problem solving, literature/language/context mastery, and personal initiative and communication skills • Increased connection to and retention within the major • Improved understanding of professional work within an academic discipline • Stronger enrollment in graduate education • Increased employment in major-related fields • Greater participation in other intellectual opportunities on campus • Overcoming traditional boundaries for women, students of color, and first-generation students

  6. Benefiting Students • Analytical Skills • Understanding of Ethics • Time Management • Communication • Self-Confidence • Leadership • Writing Skills • Troubleshooting • Teamwork

  7. Why Undergraduate Research • Analytical Skills • Teamwork • Time Management • Leadership • Writing Skills • Troubleshooting • Understanding of Ethics • Communication • Self-Confidence

  8. Guiding Question How can we create opportunities for first and second year science students to develop the thinking dispositions necessary to be successful in a global economy that demands innovation, collaboration, flexibility and high level cognitive abilities?

  9. Visible Thinking Project • Project Zero (Harvard Graduate School of Education): • Goal: create communities of reflective, independent learners; to enhance deep understanding within disciplines; and to promote critical and creative thinking • Thinking is valued, there is time for thinking, rich opportunities for thinking, thinking is regularly modeled, process and products of thinking are present at all times A key premise of this student-centered approach is to seek ways to uncover and document learner's thinking so it can be recognized, reflected upon, and pushed further David Perkins

  10. Interdisciplinary Learning Project Veronica Boix Mansilla The MansillaFramwork includes three core dimensions: • Disciplinary Grounding: the degree students are grounded in carefully selected and adequately employed disciplinary insights • Advancement through Integration: the degree to which the leaners’ insights are clearly integrated so as to advance understanding • Critical Awareness: The degree to which the leaner exhibits a clear sense of purpose, reflectiveness, and self-critique (Adapted from Mansilla’s and Duraising’s article “Targeted Assessment of Students Interdisciplinary Work: An Empirical Grounded Framework Proposed”)

  11. Year-long interdisciplinary program for science majors that coordinates General Chemistry & College BiologyCommunity-based program that creates a cohort of students and instructorsUndergraduate Research as central part of program design Model 1: Atoms to Ecosystems

  12. Free-standing, research course for science majors 1 year commitmentAssignments throughout that are designed to build skills1 instructor, numerous mentors Model 2 Undergraduate Research in the Sciences (UGR 294)

  13. One quarter, interdisciplinary program for non-majors/AA studentsthat coordinates Intro Chemistry& BiologyCommunity-based program that creates a cohort of students and instructorsResearch-based curriculumas central part of course Model 3 Earth, Sea, Sky: Science for a Sustainable Planet

  14. Year-long interdisciplinary program for science majors that coordinates General Chemistry & College BiologyCommunity-based program that creates a cohort of students and instructorsUndergraduate Research as central part of program design Model 1: Atoms to Ecosystems

  15. 1. Solid Grounding in the Disciplines Chemistry • Models of Chemical Bonding • Structure & Shape of Molecules • Intermolecular forces Biology • Cell Membrane Structure • Cell structure and function • Protein structure and function

  16. 2. Interdisciplinary Questions or Problems • Making learning interdisciplinary by creating opportunities for chemistry and biology students to think and problem solve in an interdisciplinary context • Essential Design Elements: • Co-construction of understanding • Representing to Learn • Documentation and the link to Metacognition • Developing cognitive/thinking skills as a foundation for research projects

  17. 3. Community • Connection to Faculty & Peers • Making contributions and feeling valued • Motivated • Lasting relationship • Confidence • Increased Retention

  18. 4. Embedded Undergraduate Research Experiences • Research-based activities and UGR embedded throughout program. • All students must be viewed as capable of engaging with research early in college experience • Project centered around one key piece of instrumentation and/or collaboration • Student generated questions on a scientific issue or question that engages students in a locally relevant environmental issue • Instructors are not the experts • Second and third year students function as peer mentors • Course Credit: UGR 194 & 294

  19. Research-based Example • Investigating the Global Carbon Cycle in our Campus wetlands • Dome: IRGA • Guided Research experience • Early • Whole process

  20. Undergraduate Research Example Microplastics • Microplastics: Investigating microplastic load in freshwater runoff by sampling Lake Washington and surrounding watershed. • Manta Net

  21. Public & VisibleUniversity of Washington Undergraduate Research Symposium2006 - 2013Posters on the Hill, Washington D.C.Spring 2007 & 2010AAAS, Vancouver BC2012National ACS Conference2011 & 2012Making Learning Visible, NSCC2006-2013

  22. Student Perceptions: Kat Perreira How did the research project you completed in A2E change you as a learner and thinker? Be prepared to expect unexpected results, trouble shoot, handle problems as they c0me up, think clearly about questions we have and how to solve them, endurance, perseverance when results did not come out as expected, creative thinker, creative question asker, how to utilize the tools, how to work in a team and delegate. • Completed A2E in 2009 • 3rd year student • 3 Research projects • UW (x3) and Posters on the Hill 2010

  23. Student Perceptions: Kat Perreira What was it like to enter other science classes after completing your first year of A2E? Wonderful, I was very well prepared for organic chemistry. Having seen the big picture of Bio and Chem together I could see how everything connects. I also found myself constantly wondering how scientists figure the things out that we were learning. Confident, more so than other students, we were so far ahead, learned to work really well together, how to ask questions, how to work together as a group, helping each other, at the end we could help each other with life, because we knew each other and how each other thinks. It was okay that not everything had an answer and we knew how to tackle new material confidently

  24. High Impact Practice What skills are important for 1st and 2nd year science students? How can we scaffold a research-based curriculum to set students up for success? Are traditional UGR models the only way to go?

  25. Discussion In groups of 4, take a few minutes to discuss the following: • What skills, attitudes or thinking dispositions can be taught through research-based curriculum in the first 2 years of introductory science courses?

  26. n Borough of Manhattan Community College Workshop, April 2013

  27. Designing for Success – An Example from A2E

  28. Designing Across the Program

  29. Moving Towards an Intentional UGR Program Design for First 2 Years • Identify research skills at multiple academic levels • Articulate how UGR can help students achieve course, program and institutional outcomes • Create assignments that help to scaffold student learning as a means to master research skills • Seamlessly embed UGR and Research-based assignments into traditional curriculum • Combination of Research-based and UGR • Expand: Design across entirescience program

  30. Discussion In groups of 4, take a few minutes to discuss the following: • What ideas do you have for embedding research-based curriculum into your science program? Is it essential that it be traditional Undergraduate Research, or can you imagine a research-based curriculum?

  31. Conclusion • Embedded research-based curriculum as a model for creating the thinking dispositions necessary to be successful in a global economy that demands innovation, collaboration, flexibility and high level cognitive abilities? • Intentional design as a means to maximize the effects of research as a high impact practice • Traditional models for undergraduate research are not the entire story when working with students in the first 2 years of a college experience. • Must view all students as capable!

  32. Acknowledgements National Science Foundation Council on Undergraduate Research Brent Cejda, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Sonya Remington, Bellevue Community College

  33. One way to Define UGR… Undergraduate research is an inquiry or investigation conducted by an undergraduate in collaboration with a faculty mentor that makes an original intellectual or creative contribution to the discipline. (from http://www.cur.org/factsheet.html)

  34. Research-Like Course List of provisional features of Research-like course • It has a lab or project where no one, including the course instructor, knows the answer • It has a lab or project in which students have some input into the research process • It has a project entirely of student design • Students become responsible for part of the project • Students critique the work of other students **Many other elements that make a course research-like

  35. Undergraduate Research Example • Growth of the Green Microalga, Botryococcus braunii in a Vertical Photobioreactor • What are the optimal conditions to grow Botryococcus braunii to maximize lipid production in a model system that could be upscaled? • What is the relationship between light, CO2(g) nutrient modification on Botryococcus braunii? • What is the capability of this alga to be produced in larger scale photobioreactor system?

  36. Winter Quarter • Research Question/Written Proposal • Guest Speakers • Journal Club/Research Updates • Data Collection and Timelines • Progress Report in the form of a PPT presentation to campus community • Submit abstract to University of Washington Undergraduate Research Symposium (if appropriate) Second Year • Peer Mentors • Leaders, Coordinators • Grant writing • Continued projects • Travel/National Conferences • Spring Quarter • Data Collection • Formal research updates to other groups/instructors • Data interpretation and representation • Guest speakers/off camps seminars • Prepare scientific poster and participate in campus-wide Making Learning Visible Symposium and/or other UGR Conference Fall Quarter • Research Day/Brainstorm • Library tour & Literature Review • Guest Speakers/ off campus seminars • In-class seminars of journal articles • Poster Project that serves as initial project Proposal and Background • Peer Review Activities • Small scale research experience/experimental design

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