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A course-based research experience: how benefits change with increased investment in instructional time.

ABSTRACT: There is widespread agreement that science, technology, engineering, and mathematics programs should provide undergraduates with research experience. Practical issues and limited resources, however, make this a challenge. We have developed a bioinformatics project that provides a course-based research experience for students at a diverse group of schools and offers the opportunity to tailor this experience to local curriculum and institution-specific student needs. We assessed both attitude and knowledge gains, looking for insights into how students respond given this wide range of curricular and institutional variables. While different approaches all appear to result in learning gains, we find that a significant investment of course time is required to enable students to show gains commensurate to a summer research experience. An alumni survey revealed that time spent on a research project is also a significant factor in the value former students assign to the experience one or more years later. We conclude: 1) implementation of a bioinformatics project within the biology curriculum provides a mechanism for successfully engaging large numbers of students in undergraduate research; 2) benefits to students are achievable at a wide variety of academic institutions; and 3) successful implementation of course-based research experiences requires significant investment of instructional time for students to gain full benefit.

SUBMITTER: Shaffer CD

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3940452 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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A course-based research experience: how benefits change with increased investment in instructional time.

Shaffer Christopher D CD Alvarez Consuelo J CJ Bednarski April E AE Dunbar David D Goodman Anya L AL Reinke Catherine C Rosenwald Anne G AG Wolyniak Michael J MJ Bailey Cheryl C Barnard Daron D Bazinet Christopher C Beach Dale L DL Bedard James E J JE Bhalla Satish S Braverman John J Burg Martin M Chandrasekaran Vidya V Chung Hui-Min HM Clase Kari K Dejong Randall J RJ Diangelo Justin R JR Du Chunguang C Eckdahl Todd T TT Eisler Heather H Emerson Julia A JA Frary Amy A Frohlich Donald D Gosser Yuying Y Govind Shubha S Haberman Adam A Hark Amy T AT Hauser Charles C Hoogewerf Arlene A Hoopes Laura L M LL Howell Carina E CE Johnson Diana D Jones Christopher J CJ Kadlec Lisa L Kaehler Marian M Silver Key S Catherine SC Kleinschmit Adam A Kokan Nighat P NP Kopp Olga O Kuleck Gary G Leatherman Judith J Lopilato Jane J Mackinnon Christy C Martinez-Cruzado Juan Carlos JC McNeil Gerard G Mel Stephanie S Mistry Hemlata H Nagengast Alexis A Overvoorde Paul P Paetkau Don W DW Parrish Susan S Peterson Celeste N CN Preuss Mary M Reed Laura K LK Revie Dennis D Robic Srebrenka S Roecklein-Canfield Jennifer J Rubin Michael R MR Saville Kenneth K Schroeder Stephanie S Sharif Karim K Shaw Mary M Skuse Gary G Smith Christopher D CD Smith Mary A MA Smith Sheryl T ST Spana Eric E Spratt Mary M Sreenivasan Aparna A Stamm Joyce J Szauter Paul P Thompson Jeffrey S JS Wawersik Matthew M Youngblom James J Zhou Leming L Mardis Elaine R ER Buhler Jeremy J Leung Wilson W Lopatto David D Elgin Sarah C R SC

CBE life sciences education 20140101 1

There is widespread agreement that science, technology, engineering, and mathematics programs should provide undergraduates with research experience. Practical issues and limited resources, however, make this a challenge. We have developed a bioinformatics project that provides a course-based research experience for students at a diverse group of schools and offers the opportunity to tailor this experience to local curriculum and institution-specific student needs. We assessed both attitude and ...[more]

PMID: 24591510

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Project description:Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) are an effective means of transforming the learning and teaching of science by involving students in the scientific process. The potential importance of the microbiome in shaping both environmental health and disease makes investigations of microbiomes an excellent teaching tool for undergraduate microbiology. Here, we present a CURE based on the microbiome of the bean beetle (Callosobruchus maculatus), a model system for undergraduate laboratory education. Despite the extensive research literature on bean beetles, little is known about their microbiome, making them an ideal system for a discovery-based CURE. In the CURE, students acquire microbiological technical skills by characterizing both culturable and unculturable members of the beetle gut-microbial community. Students plate beetle gut homogenates on different media, describe the colonies that are formed to estimate taxonomic diversity, extract DNA from colonies of interest, PCR amplify the16S rRNA gene for Sanger sequencing, and use the NCBI-nBLAST database to taxonomically classify sequences. Additionally, students extract total DNA from beetle gut homogenates for high-throughput paired-end sequencing and perform bioinformatic and statistical analyses of bacterial communities using a combination of open-access data processing software. Each activity allows students to engage with studies of microbiomes in a real-world context, to apply concepts and laboratory techniques to investigate either student or faculty-driven research questions, and to gain valuable experiences working with large high-throughput datasets. The CURE is designed such that it can be implemented over either 6-weeks (half semester) or 12-weeks (full semester), allowing for flexibility within the curriculum. Furthermore, student-generated data from the CURE (including bacterial colony phenotypic data, full-length 16S rRNA gene sequences from cultured isolates, and bacterial community sequences from gut homogenates) has been compiled in a continuously curated open-access database on the Bean Beetle Microbiome Project website, facilitating the generation of broader research questions across laboratory classrooms.

Project description:Abstract Human‐centered, active‐learning approaches can help students develop core competencies in biology and other STEM fields, including the ability to conduct research, use quantitative reasoning, communicate across disciplinary boundaries, and connect science education to pressing social and environmental challenges. Promising approaches for incorporating active learning into biology courses include the use of course‐based research, community engagement, and international experiences. Disruption to higher education due to the COVID‐19 pandemic made each of these approaches more challenging or impossible to execute. Here, we describe a scalable course‐based undergraduate research experience (CURE) for an animal behavior course that integrates research and community engagement in a remote international experience. Students in courses at two U.S. universities worked with community partners to analyze the behavior of African goats grazing near informal settlements in Western Cape, South Africa. Partners established a relationship with goat herders, and then created 2‐min videos of individual goats that differed in criteria (goat sex and time of day) specified by students. Students worked in small groups to choose dependent variables, and then compared goat behavior across criteria using a factorial design. In postcourse surveys, students from both universities indicated overall enthusiasm for the experience. In general, students indicated that the laboratory provided them with “somewhat more” of a research‐based experience compared with biology laboratories they had taken of similar length, and “somewhat more” to “much more” of a community‐engagement and international experience. Educational benefits were complemented by the fact that international educational partners facing economic hardship due to the pandemic received payment for services. Future iterations of the CURE can focus on goat behavior differences across ecological conditions to help herders increase production in the face of continued environmental and social challenges. More generally, applying the structure of this CURE could facilitate mutually beneficial collaborations with residents of under‐resourced areas around the world. Course‐based research, community engagement, and international experiences can enhance undergraduate biology education, but each were made more challenging due to the COVID‐19 pandemic. Here, we describe a scalable course‐based undergraduate research experience focusing on African goat behavior that integrates research and community engagement in a remote international experience. Educational benefits for students were complemented by the fact that international educational partners facing economic hardship due to the pandemic could receive payment for services.

Dataset Information

A course-based research experience: how benefits change with increased investment in instructional time.

Publications

A course-based research experience: how benefits change with increased investment in instructional time.

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