RET Site: Rural Educators Engaged in Bioanalytical Engineering Research and Teaching

University Of Oklahoma Norman Campus, Norman OK

Investigators

Abstract

This Research Experiences for Teachers (RET) in Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Oklahoma (OU) Norman will involve rural high school science and mathematics teachers and regional community college instructors in bioanalytical engineering research, to help them improve STEM teaching in their classrooms, and to have them participate in a sustainable professional network that will increase the number of rural students who select and successfully graduate from higher education STEM fields. Bioanalytical engineering encompasses the design and manipulation of biomolecules, viruses, bacteria and cells, as well as the fabrication of innovative analytical devices for the detection and monitoring of these biomaterials. These efforts directly address pertinent problems related to medicine, public health, petroleum and biofuel production, bioremediation of groundwater, and designing target-specific pharmaceuticals. Because these are important and relevant topics for Oklahoma rural communities, integrating these topics into STEM education will: strengthen rural education, build a network of educators (ranging from rural high school teachers and regional community college instructors to university research faculty), and promote a career-preparation pathway for rural youth in Oklahoma. This effort will increase the Oklahoma workforce, which needs highly trained professionals in these areas. In the long-term, the knowledge and results gained from this RET program will help build sustainable education initiatives to reach rural students and teachers, and as a result, will support sustainable rural communities. Over three years, 48 rural Oklahoma educators (high school teachers and regional community college instructors) will conduct bioanalytical engineering research (for seven weeks each summer) at the University of Oklahoma (OU) in collaboration with eight faculty associated with the OU Center for Bioanalysis (CBA). The summer research experience will be designed according to the SUCCESS Framework to maximize RET educators' sense of efficacy for conducting research and to increase their motivation to transfer these experiences into their classrooms. The SUCCESS Framework guides teachers, designers and instructors at all levels and in all contexts, providing a structure for integrating theory-based motivational features into any type of instruction. Educators will be recruited from three regions of rural Oklahoma that are typically overlooked because of their distance from urban centers and major universities. Educators from the same or adjacent rural districts will be paired to facilitate collaboration in the development and implementation of authentic, guided-inquiry curricula that utilize fundamental STEM concepts, apply bioanalytical engineering, and address issues of rural interest and relevance. The SUCCESS Framework will be integrated into the curricular design to improve the students' motivation in learning and the educators' teaching efficacy. This collaboration will establish a professional rural educator network that includes interactions with faculty research mentors and graduate students through classroom visits, field trips, sampling trips, virtual presentations and interactions. The professional rural educator network will be further strengthened and expanded upon by dissemination of curricular materials and motivational design methods through workshops for rural STEM educators at the annual OU K20 Center's Innovative Learning Institute, annual sessions on rural STEM education at the National Rural Education Association, and educator-student poster sessions and presentations at the annual CBA symposium.