The Networking Systems Biologists with Community College (CC) Educators Project launched in Spring 2021 with the recruitment of 11 CC faculty members from 7 Washington state campuses and 2 scientists from ISB to participate in an 80 hour professional learning experience.

During the first half of the work project staff facilitated ISB scientists to lead CC faculty through a course focused on using quantitative research tools to explore microbiome data. Faculty learned about methods used to analyze large datasets and ways to answer questions involving the large amounts of data involved in looking at complicated biological systems.

For the second half of the work, the project team, CC faculty, and ISB scientists worked together to create modules for each of  the three core introduction biology courses taught across Washington?s CC system. One group developed a molecular biology module focusing on the big dataset analysis of microbiomes. Students read a paper looking at analysis of a microbiome dataset and then analyze some additional data from the paper.  Another group developed an ecology lab in which students access microbiome data for patients before, during and after antibiotic use and use a Google colab notebook built specifically for student analysis of the data. The animal systems group used BLAST analysis of some proteins to create several phylogenies and used the principle of parsimony to determine which is the most likely explanation. Each module was designed to be implementable in an online format.

During the 2021-22 academic year, participant faculty implemented the activities in online, hybrid, and in person settings. As of August 2022,10 of the participating faculty members have implemented at least one of the 3 designed activities, impacting approximately 300-400 students.

Nine faculty shared their experiences implementing the designed activities and how the experience more broadly impacted their teaching. Faculty expressed overwhelmingly positive reports about the implementation and high confidence in supporting students to develop quantitative biology skills.

Faculty reported that an additional 300 students who were in courses where the activities were not implemented were positively impacted by the increased knowledge of the CC faculty. Specifically, 5 of 9 faculty said their students spent more time? interpreting the biological meaning of results? and ?describing how quantitative reasoning helps biologists understand the natural world?.

Students report engaging in learning activities that help build quantitative literacy. Furthermore, students report gaining quantitative literacy skills related to these activities and exposure to biological data. Students report the most growth in more advanced quantitative skills such as using data to defend and refute claims. Part of the impetus for incorporating current research into these courses was to increase engagement and the relevance of biology to these student?s lives and current scholarship. This seems to have translated as 67% of students felt the topics covered in the course were interesting to them;  72% felt the topics were based on real-world problems, and 59% felt the course helped them build skills that are relevant to other parts of their life. 

Based on evaluation data and the experiences of the project team, the following successes and/or challenges have emerged and impacted the design of future programs:

• Learning Timeline: The COVID pandemic revealed the importance and increased accessibility of virtual professional development. Participants in the Project shared that the burnout and the concentrated structure of the project was intense and negatively impacted their learning; they expressed a desire to have more time between the intense learning experiences. 

• Professional development structure - As observed by the project team and reported by the participants, one of the most successful components of our professional development was journal clubs, where faculty participants read an article and then discussed the article with one of the authors. This allowed faculty to dive into current research, and helped faculty and scientists develop relationships and connections and engage in meaningful dialogue that varied from science to pedagogy.

Cohort Structure - The cohort for the Incubator Project was 10 faculty, 2 scientists, and project leadership. The structure favored a flow of information from the scientists to the faculty, and placed a significant burden on the scientists as the ?knowledge holders?. A more balanced cohort will relieve some of the burden on the scientists and create opportunities for structured discussions in which all sides hold knowledge that will benefit the group. 

Last Modified: 02/02/2023
Modified by: Jennifer Eklund