10. Collaborative, Specialized Partitioning of a Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experience for Majors and Allied Health Biology Students

Abstract

The objectives of this project were to measure a student’s ability to go complete a research report and to observe demonstrations of key fundamental research aspects such as understanding scientific works, collecting and entering data, analyzing and creating graphs, and overall how to write a lab report. Working with Principles of Biology II and Microbiology classes, students were provided with a topic and methodology respective to their class; however, groups within the classes had the freedom to create their own hypotheses and theses, choose how to collect and interpret data, make charts and graphs, and ultimately write a lab report. Students were asked how they felt performing such tasks at the beginning and end of the Bugs in Bugs project, where they rated each aspect from 1 to 5 and wrote about any other kind of research work they may have done in the past. An understanding of scientific works and research on a fundamental level is important to everyone, not only scientists, because otherwise it is difficult to engage in and discuss science-related issues; this is crucial in the modern era where science grows ever so more politicized and polarized.