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1. Implementing and Assessing a Joint REU/RET Program in Materials Science

   Salzman, Noah; Nadelson, Louis; Ubic, Rick (January 2016, ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition)

   In this paper we describe a joint Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) and Research Experience for Teachers (RET) program focused on energy and sustainability topics within a Materials Science and Engineering program at a public university. This program brought ten undergraduate science and engineering students and five local middle and high school teachers on campus for an 8-week research experiences working with different lab groups. Given the relatively small number of participants, we chose qualitative interviews as our primary source of data for assessing the effectiveness of this program. The participants identified numerous positive aspects of participating in the summer research program. Students appreciated the sense of community they developed with both the other participants in the research program and the other members of their lab groups. Although most of the participants did not report the summer research experience as having a strong influence on their decisions to pursue graduate school or careers involving research, they did report both being more confident in their ability to be successful as a researcher and appreciating the opportunity to learn more about the practice of engineering research in an academic setting. For the teachers involved in the program we describe how participation influenced their leadership, perceptions of adoption educational innovations, and willingness to provide more opportunities to engage their students in authentic STEM research. The participants also provided several recommendations for improvement to the summer research program. For the students, these included more materials in advance and a more streamlined onboarding process to allow them to get up to speed on their projects more quickly, consistent access to their supervisors, and work that is intellectually challenging. Suggestion from the teacher participants for improvement mostly involved requests for more guidance on how to incorporate what they were learning in their research into lessons for their classrooms. By describing this program and the successes and challenges encountered by the participants and organizers, we intend to help others considering implementing REU/RET programs or other summer research experiences to design and implement successful programs. 

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2. INTEGRATING COMPUTATIONAL THINKING IN HIGH SCHOOL BIOLOGY AND CHEMISTRY CLASSES

   https://doi.org/10.21125/inted.2020.1970  

   Gotwals, R. (January 2020, INTED proceedings)

   Computational thinking is identified as one of the “essential skills for 21st-Century students.” [1] Studies of CT in school programs are being funded by many organizations, including the United States National Science Foundation. In this paper, we describe “lessons learned” over the first two years of a research program (PREDICTS: Principles and Resources for Educators to Infuse Computational Thinking in the Sciences) with the goal of developing knowledge of how to integrate CT into introductory high school biology and chemistry classes for all students. Using curricular modules developed by program staff, two in biology and two in chemistry, teachers piloting the program engaged students in CT with computational evidence from authentic tools in order to develop understanding of science concepts. Each module, representing about a week of instruction, addresses science ideas in the prescribed course of study for high school programs. Project researchers have collected survey data on teachers’: (1) beliefs about effective science teaching; (2) beliefs about their effectiveness as a science teacher and their students’ ability to learn science, and; (3) content preparedness. In addition, we observed module implementation, collected and analyzed student artifacts, and interviewed teachers at the conclusion of module implementation. Preliminary results indicated some challenges (access to technology, varying levels of experience among students) and cause for optimism (student and teacher engagement in CT and the computational tools used in the modules). Continuing research efforts are described in this paper, along with descriptions of the curricular modules and the use of observations and “CT check-ins” to assess student engagement in, application of, and learning of CT. 

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3. A research program-linked, course-based undergraduate research experience that allows undergraduates to participate in current research on mycobacterial gene regulation

   https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.1025250  

   Roberts, Louis Anthony; Shell, Scarlet S. (January 2023, Frontiers in Microbiology)

   Undergraduate instructional biology laboratories are typically taught within two paradigms. Some labs focus on protocols and techniques delivered in “cookbook” format with defined experimental outcomes. There is increasing momentum to alternatively employ student-driven, open-ended, and discovery-based strategies, oftenviacourse-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) using crowd-sourcing initiatives. A fraction of students also participate in funded research in faculty research labs, where they have opportunities to work on projects designed to expand the frontiers of human knowledge. These experiences are widely recognized as valuable but are not scalable, as most institutions have many more undergraduates than research lab positions. We sought to address this gap through our department’s curriculum by creating an opportunity for students to participate in the real-world research process within a laboratory course. We conceived, developed, and delivered an authentic, guided research experience to students in an upper-level molecular biology laboratory course. We refer to this model as a “research program-linked CURE.” The research questions come directly from a faculty member’s research lab and evolve along with that research program. Students study post-transcriptional regulation in mycobacteria. We use current molecular biology methodologies to test hypotheses like “UTRs affect RNA and protein expression levels,” “there is functional redundancy among RNA helicases,” and “carbon starvation alters mRNA 5′ end chemistries.” We conducted standard assessments and developed a customized “Skills and Concepts Inventory” survey to gauge how well the course met our student learning outcomes. We report the results of our assessments and describe challenges addressed during development and execution of the course, including organizing activities to fit within an instructional lab, balancing breadth with depth, and maintaining authenticity while giving students the experience of obtaining interpretable and novel results. Our data suggest student learning was enhanced through this truly authentic research approach. Further, students were able to perceive they were participants and contributors within an active research paradigm. Students reported increases in their self-identification as scientists, and a positive impact on their career trajectories. An additional benefit was reciprocation back to the funded research laboratory, by funneling course alumni, results, materials, and protocols. 

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4. Work in Progress: Motivational Differences Between Civil and Environmental Engineering Doctoral Students in the Pre-writing and Writing Phases

   Rodriguez_Mejia, Eduardo; Bodnar, Cheryl A (June 2024, ASEE Conferences)

   This work in progress paper describes the preliminary findings from the implementation of a graduate engineering student motivation survey with Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) doctoral students. In the doctoral process, two phases can be identified: pre-writing and writing. The first phase is generally where most of the coursework is taken, while the second phase is when the dissertation takes most of the time. These phases have been found to be of importance when seeking to address graduate students’ motivation because they present a transition between a more structured and guided process into an unstructured, self-directed, and isolated phase that is prescribed as challenging for students. The graduate student motivation survey, derived from the Expectancy-Value Theory constructs (i.e., interest, attainment, utility, cost, and self-efficacy), was developed by the authors in a prior study. The constructs of interest/intrinsic (how fun and interesting is a task), attainment (personal/identity importance of a task), utility (usefulness for present or future goals), and cost (resources to be invested in a task) are values that individuals consider when selecting and taking actions; Whereas, the self-efficacy construct explores an individual’s beliefs about how well their performance will be on an upcoming task. This motivation survey was distributed among 20 CEE doctoral students during the second week of the Fall 2023 semester. Out of the 20 participants, 3 were in the research phase of their dissertation (writing phase), 16 were still in the process of completing their coursework requirements (pre-writing phase), and 1 did not provide a response about their program phase. Measurement of Expectancy-Value Theory constructs on a scale from 1 to 7 was performed. Analysis of the mean values for each construct between students in the pre-writing phase and those in the writing phase of their doctoral program showed statistical significance with large effect size values for the constructs of attainment and utility. Values for students in the pre-writing phase were higher on the attainment and utility construct, with students in pre-writing phase having attainment and utility mean values of M = 6.29 and M = 5.69, respectively, and those in the writing phase having M = 5.50 and M = 4.17 respectively. These preliminary results can help to better understand students' motivations during their doctoral journey, especially as they make the transition from the pre-writing to the writing phase and may lead to identification of areas where additional support can be provided. 

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5. US-Sweden Bioinformatics IRES: Investigating Engineering Students’ Attitudes and Perspectives Throughout a 10-week International Research Program

   Chapman, Mark A; Forbes, Marissa H. (July 2022, 2022 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition)

   The US-Sweden Clinical Bioinformatics Research Training Program is an NSF-funded International Research Experience for Students (IRES) program that aims to develop a diverse cohort of globally competent and engaged scientists/engineers that seek career opportunities and collaborators throughout the world. The program consists of a six-week preparatory virtual training series, a 4-day pre-departure symposium at the University of San Diego and a ten-week research program on site at the Science for Life Laboratory in Stockholm, Sweden. The focus of this paper is to examine student attitudes and perspectives during their time abroad through an analysis of blog entries. In Summer 2021, six engineering undergraduates—three women and three men—participated in the inaugural program session. Over the course of the ten-week program, the students completed blog posts in response to four prompts related to their experiences, observations, and challenges. In this paper, we present a qualitative analysis of the student blogs using a hybrid deductive and inductive thematic analysis approach. Our findings span two primary categories: professional and personal. 

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