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1. K. Le, T. Butterfield, K.E. Kelly, Citizen scientist engagement in air quality monitoring, Proc. ASEE Annual Meeting, June 23 – 27, Salt Lake City, UT.

   Le, K.; Butterfield, T.; Kelly, K.E. (July 2018, Review & directory - American Society for Engineering Education)

   Citizen scientist efforts, wherein members of the public who are not professional scientists participate in active research, have been shown to effectively engage the public in STEM fields and result in valuable data, essential to answering pressing research questions. However, most citizen scientist efforts have been centered in colleges of science, and a limited number have crossed into research areas important to chemical engineering fields. In this work we report on the results of a project to recruit high school and middle school students across Utah’s Salt Lake Valley as citizen scientists and potential engineering students who work in partnership with chemical engineering researchers in an effort to create a distributed online network of air quality sensors. Middle and high school students were trained by undergraduate mentors to monitor and maintain their own outdoor air quality sensor with the help of teaching materials that were co-developed with Breathe Utah, a local community group concerned with air quality. With the help of these tailored teaching modules, students learned about the science behind air quality research and the difficulties common to physical measurements to better prepare them to analyze their data. Once trained, students are expected to become semi-independent researchers in charge of monitoring and maintaining their piece of a larger air quality map. We describe in this work the hurdles inherent in citizen science engagement within a chemical engineering research program and the means to address them. We describe successful means of engaging classrooms, training citizen scientists, obtaining faculty buy-in within the confines of state curricular demands, and addressing school administration concerns. With this model, we have directly engaged over 1,000 high school and over 3,000 middle school students. The project has resulted in a growing network of citizen-maintained sensors that contributes to a real-time air quality map. Student scientists may also use the sensors to participate in active research or conduct science fair projects. Student response to this citizen scientist project, where it may be measured, has been enthusiastic and almost wholly positive. 

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2. MindHive: A Community Science Platform for Human Brain and Behavior Research

   https://doi.org/10.1037/tms0000088  

   Dikker, S.; Shevchenko, Y.; Burgas, K.; Matuk, C. (January 2021, Technology, Mind & Society)

   Human brain and behavior research has traditionally—and paradoxically—taken place mostly in environments that are isolated from the public: In a typical human neuroscience study, scientists recruit university students to participate in well-controlled laboratory studies, i.e., outside of humans’ natural habitat. This model is currently under attack from multiple directions, ranging from scholars arguing that it generates biased data, to communities who express distrust toward scientists, to educators who are eager for more authentic science experiences for their students. While a growing number of researchers is turning to citizen science approaches to both educate and involve the general public in science, these initiatives are most pervasive in the ‘traditional’ sciences (e.g., ecology, astronomy), and often focus on recruiting the public to help collect data, rather than including non-scientists as partners in their scientific process. MindHive (www.mindhive.science) is an online community science platform for human brain and behavior research that engages its users in the full spectrum of scientific inquiry. Taking an open science approach, MindHive features a collaborative study design environment, comprising an experiment builder, a database of validated tasks and surveys, and a public-facing study page; a peer review center; and GDPR-compliant data collection, data management, and data visualization and interpretation functionality. We describe case studies from the COVID-19 pandemic to illustrate how MindHive envisions enabling scientists, students, educators, not-for-profit organizations, and community members globally to contribute studies, resources, and research data to the platform, as such supporting both STEM learning and scientific discovery. 

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3. A Comparative Analysis of Online and Face-to-Face Professional Development Models for CS Education

   https://doi.org/10.1145/3017680.3017784  

   Webb, David C.; Nickerson, Hilarie; Bush, Jeffrey B. (January 2017, 10.1145/3017680.3017784)

   This paper compares student outcomes from 75 K-12 teachers who participated in either online, blended, or face-to-face professional development design to support teacher implementation of a programming curriculum during the regular school day. The results are based on survey responses collected over two years from 4,832 students. With only one exception, the results showed no negative student outcomes when comparing student survey results from teachers who participated in online professional development compared to students of teachers who participated in face-to-face professional development. Students who had teachers who participated in face-to-face professional development, however, expressed stronger interest in designing their own games at home. These results suggest that online professional development that is designed to support K-12 teacher classroom implementation of CS education curricula is a viable model with respect to student outcomes. Recommendations for the design of online curricula for CS education are discussed. 

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4. Lighting a Pathway to Energy Transitions: Collecting, Interpreting and Sharing Engineering Designs and Research Data Across a School-based Agrivoltaics Citizen Science Network (Pre-College Resource/Curriculum Exchange)

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--47747  

   Jordan, Michelle; Spreitzer, Katie; Bendok, Sarah (June 2024, ASEE Conferences)

   SPV Lab is developing an innovation model for school-based citizen science that supports a networked approach to community-centered knowledge building. Students and teachers on each SPV Lab campus interact through sharing of data and lab reports, using an online platform to facilitate collaboration at a distance. Students not only learn, but also contribute to scientific knowledge of a new area of engineering research, i.e., agrivoltaics, and to their communities, providing social value through clean energy and food production. Creation of an SPV Lab citizen science network that supports and sustains student and community learning in the area of sustainable food and energy. 10 teachers were trained in 2022 and 10 more teachers were trained in 2023. The reach of these two cohorts is vast as they impact more than 30 students per year each. Conservatively this translated into nearly 1000 K-12 students gaining knowledge in the area of agriPV. The inclusion of the youth population in sustainability science and initiatives is necessary with increasing climate concerns and the push for cleaner energy. Introducing the younger populations to collaborative learning experiences about sustainable energy production is the goal of the Sonoran Photovoltaic Lab (SPV Lab). SPV Lab is a network of students, teachers, scientists, engineers, and community partners encouraging equitable, lasting, sustainable energy transitions. This group is working to increase photovoltaic systems and educate the next generation of energy researchers, knowledgeable citizens, and students to ensure that underserved students in Arizona have equitable opportunities to participate in experiential learning programs to gain a newfound understanding of sustainable systems and their impact on the environment. Members of the SPV Lab work collaboratively to achieve active engineering citizen science for K-12 students in agrivoltaics engineering research. Agrivoltaics is a mixed energy source where solar panels are raised above agricultural crops or livestock. This creates a symbiotic relationship between the photovoltaic panels and the plants or animals that are located underneath. A cooling microbiome is generated beneath the solar panels that reduces the temperature in the area, thereby providing a more hospitable home for plants while increasing panel efficiency while collecting useful energy. Due to the complexity of agriPV systems, students benefit most from working side-by-side with other students, teachers, and experts to reach innovative solutions. This project represents the importance of intergenerational collaboration as the main contributors to this project included a college professor, a college student, and a high school student, all of whom contributed equally to the success of this project. Students participate in the construction of the garden beds, mapping activities, data collection, and more. Through the introduction and implementation of these activities, the students have become more invested in the success of their agrivoltaics system and are eager to support the project. The mapping activity has led to a newly cultivated understanding of These activities promoting the significance of engineering sustainable energy solutions, as well as local food systems and healthy community relationships. In a pre-college resource exchange session, SPV Lab teachers and engineering education researchers, and at least one student representative, will co-present to represent our SPV Lab network. The team will share knowledge, resources, practices, and protocols that support SPV Lab students to (a) conduct community ethnography to inform crop choices, (b) collect data in the garden using simple digital tools and time series monitoring systems, (c) analyze and interpret data from their own gardens, and (d) share lab reports and analyze data across multiple campuses. Attendees will learn how to design and build agriPV garden spaces, build a network of collaborators, and conduct citizen science in their own regions. 

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5. Critical thinking during science investigations: what do practicing teachers value and observe?

   https://doi.org/10.1080/13540602.2023.2191186  

   Butcher, Kirsten R.; Hudson, Michelle; Lane, McKenna; Larson, Madlyn (August 2023, Teachers and Teaching)

   This paper examines how practicing teachers approach and evaluate students’ critical thinking processes in science, using the implementation of an online, inquiry-based investigation in middle school classrooms as the context for teachers’ observations. Feedback and ratings from three samples of science teachers were analysed to determine how they valued and evaluated component processes of students’ critical thinking and how such processes were related to their instructional approaches and student outcomes. Drawing from an integrated view of teacher practice, results suggested that practicing science teachers readily observed and valued critical thinking processes that aligned to goal intentions focused on domain content and successful student thinking. These processes often manifested as components of effective scientific reasoning—for example, gathering evidence, analysing data, evaluating ideas, and developing strong arguments. However, teachers also expressed avoidance intentions related to student confusion and uncertainty before and after inquiry-based investigations designed for critical thinking. These findings highlight a potential disconnect between the benefits of productive student struggle for critical thinking as endorsed in the research on learning and science education and the meaning that teachers ascribe to such struggle as they seek to align their instructional practices to classroom challenges. 

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