To investigate whether the use of positive, self-promotional language in grant proposals is associated with the gender of the applicant, we used a cross-sectional analysis on 8,150 grant proposals submitted to the Swiss National Science Foundation in life sciences disciplines across three different funding schemes, targeting applicants at…

This research investigated how middle school science teachers integrated engineering into their planned science instruction and the extent to which they conceptually linked science to engineering following participation in a professional development program. Video recordings of six teachers' classroom implementation of teacher-designed units were…

Teaching in rural schools is frequently marked by challenges ranging from restricted technological infrastructure and geographical remoteness to sparse professional development. Guided by the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT), this paper reports findings from a sequential explanatory mixed-methods study that investigated…

Previous studies have linked experiences with chance events to shifts in career intentions, but they have not investigated chance events as agents of career shifts in graduate students. This study investigated the types of chance events and perceived impacts of those events on the career intentions of life science graduate students at a university…

This study examined the effectiveness of professional development (PD) strategies employed by the University of South Africa (UNISA) to empower teachers (as adult learners) to enhance learner performance in the life sciences (LS). The context of this study is the partnership between the Department of Education and institutions of higher learning.…

Virtual laboratories (VLs) enable students to experiment, analyze data, or interact with digital content in a nonphysical space. VLs include simulations, electronic notebooks, videos, and augmented reality. As part of the "VL Project," comprising five academic institutions in Ireland, we sought to determine how VLs might enhance…

This research focuses on how research ethics committee and integrity board members discuss and decide on solutions to case scenarios that involve a dimension of research ethics or integrity in collaborative settings. The cases involved issues around authorship, conflict of interest, disregard of good scientific practice and ethics review, and…

Through the lens of the talent development megamodel and the higher mastery framework, this instrumental case study examines the career trajectory of a biological anthropologist, Barbara J. King, who became a persuasive science communicator in the struggle for animal justice. Much of her impact stems from her development in two career paths, one…

This study aims to understand middle and high school students' ecosystem knowledge including knowledge about the food web, food pyramid, and energy flow. The data were collected from 250 middle school and high school students. Students' drawings were used to collect data and coded as correct, wrong, or no answer. Then, students' wrong answers were…

Within the scope of this investigation, educational instruments grounded on materialist ontology were employed to undertake a semantic analysis of the concepts of cell and the mechanisms of living organisms as they appear in biology and natural science textbooks. Drawing upon the ontological categories applied to distinct biological system levels,…

Background: Students from low-socioeconomic status backgrounds (LSES) are underrepresented in STEM education, including in the biological sciences. As one of the foundational STEM disciplines, biology represents an interesting case study in that women earn the most undergraduate degrees, a trend that holds across racial/ethnic groups. However,…

Students are increasingly expected to take up proactive roles in feedback processes. While most feedback research focuses on asking, receiving, and engaging with feedback, some suggest that students must also proactively shape their feedback environment. This study explored graduate life science master's students' first impressions of a dialogue…

In higher education, diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) statements are texts written by faculty members which explain their commitments to improving education for marginalized students. Requesting, reviewing, and acting upon DEI statements is just one practice, among others, which higher education institutions can use to transform individual…

Teachers' conceptions of teaching play a key role in the pedagogical practices they apply in their teaching. Previous studies of conceptions of teaching generic skills have been mainly qualitative with small samples, and thus there is a need for a more extensive quantitative study. This study investigates the associations between higher education…

Attention paid to awarding gaps in higher education linked to ethnicity tends to focus on outcomes at the final award stage. Our project sought to scrutinise awarding gaps at module level where these gaps may emerge. Our aim was twofold: to identify the most important barriers to student success and determine strategies to reduce awarding gaps at…