There has been a call from the national community of biologists and biology educators to increase biological literacy of undergraduate students, including understanding and application of core concepts. The structure and function relationship is a core concept identified by the wider biology community and by physiology faculty. Understanding of…

Gerrymandering is a controversial practice in American politics, and one that has generated a significant amount of legal, academic, and political interest. While gerrymandering is an important and timely topic, this issue receives relatively little attention in most introductory courses in American government. This omission is compounded by the…

Conveying scientific information with high intrinsic cognitive load to students is a challenge. Often, students do not have the existing schema to incorporate the information in a comprehensive manner. One method that has shown promise is storytelling. Storytelling has been successfully used to convey public health information to non-experts.…

Individuals coming from low-income backgrounds, particularly women and people of color, are disproportionately underrepresented in STEM fields. The low representation is often attributed to low enrollment and completion rates in STEM programs. Community colleges play a crucial role in increasing diversity in the workforce. However, there is not…

STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education in the United States faces a host of problems including low recruitment and retention in STEM disciplines, under-representation of multiple segments of the US population, and a host of other issues. These problems are well recognized and a variety of solutions are being implemented…

Science education reform documents call for students to learn science by engaging in inquiry and using science practices. One such science practice is constructing evidence-based explanations. Few students enter community college science classrooms having experience with, or being proficient in, using evidence to explain scientific phenomena.…

Physics lab instruction is evolving in response to changing technology, a desire to better prepare students for diverse careers, and renewed focus from physics education researchers. To prepare researchers to evaluate progress in instructional labs in the future, this study set out to understand the current state of instructional physics labs in…

Despite the large body of evidence that indicates activity-based instruction is more effective than lecture-only instruction, for the purpose of workload calculation, many community colleges assign less value to the time spent in science lab than in lecture. This discrepancy is inconsistent with goals of science excellence set by the National…

Introductory courses in biology often lack sufficient emphasis on quantitative skills and interdisciplinary problem solving, leaving many students unprepared for more advanced biology coursework and hampering their ability to pursue biology research careers. MathBench Biology Modules were created to enhance the quantitative skills of biology…

Cankdeska Cikana Community College (CCCC) is a tribally controlled institution of higher learning that always has its eye on cultural inclusion, whether in STEM or any other program. The mathematics program at CCCC is the underlying force that ties everything together. Each of the Associate of Science degree programs requires that students pass…

Instructors expect students to read before class to engage them in using higher-order thinking skills that are critical to performing in group work and engaging in discussions. As many instructors are aware, however, for various reasons many students don't read the assigned textbook. In this study, science news articles were used as prereadings to…

This Data Point uses data from the 2015-16 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS:16), a national survey of undergraduates enrolled in Title IV eligible postsecondary institutions, to examine the characteristics of students seeking subbaccalaureate credentials (certificates and associate's degrees) in health sciences. The Data Point…

Langara College, as one of the leading undergraduate institutions in the province of British Columbia (BC), offers the "Applied Science for Engineering" two-year diploma program as well as the "Engineering Transfer" two-semester certificate program. Three project-based courses are offered as part of the two-year diploma program…

I aimed to document the online undergraduate course supply in biology to evaluate how well biology educators are serving the diverse and growing population of online students. I documented online biology course offerings in the 2015-2016 academic year at 96 American colleges and universities. I quantified differences in variety, extent, and…

Recently, global trends in technological development have brought about innovations in educational paradigms, thus giving rise to significant adoption of learner-centered and problem-centered approaches with greater potential to impart the next generation of learners compared to a more dominant teacher-centered approach. In view of this, this…