RCN-UBE Incubator: Enhancing Undergraduate Biology Education through Science Communication

University Of Denver, Denver CO

Investigators

Abstract

Confronting the accelerated pace of environmental change demands both a scientifically literate public and a new generation of ecologists and other scientists prepared to communicate scientific knowledge to educators, policymakers, managers, and others. In recent years, efforts have been made to enhance the communication skills of graduate students and faculty. However, undergraduate students far outnumber scientists with advanced degrees and are likely to interact frequently with a broad set of public stakeholders. Biology undergraduates are ideally situated to help translate science and reach a broad audience. To better serve these roles, undergraduates need formal training and practice in science communication. The SciComm RCN-UBE will unify a group of researchers dedicated to improving the communication skills of undergraduate students so they may more effectively convey scientific discoveries to the public. Effective science communication of all types engages citizens in scientific practices and discovery, educates policymakers, and facilitates an accurate representation of the scientific process and its discoveries. Work to enhance undergraduate science communication is currently happening in silos with little communication between them. There is thus a need to bring practitioners together to assess best practices and articulate a clear research agenda. To that end, the SciComm Network has two objectives: 1) build a collaborative, interdisciplinary community of scholars dedicated to training undergraduate students in effective science communication for the public; and 2) disseminate teaching tools, articulate a research agenda, and plan for objective evaluation of undergraduate science communication training programs. These objectives will be achieved by holding a workshop to facilitate collaboration between faculty from eleven diverse institutions--public and private universities, minority-serving institutions, a museum, a military academy, and community colleges--evaluating existing science communication programs and generating a web-based repository of undergraduate science communication resources. SciComm also aims to identify outstanding "grand challenges" in science communication education and consult with science learning researchers and evaluators to provide quantitative and qualitative assessments of the role of training in developing undergraduate communication skills, content knowledge, and self-efficacy. In this way, SciComm will move the field beyond acknowledging the need to train undergraduate students in science communication to improving how it is done, thereby impacting the perception and understanding of science by the public at large. Co-funding for this project is being provided by the Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (IUSE: EHR) program in recognition of the project's alignment with the overarching goals of the IUSE: EHR program. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.