Colby College clearly recognizes the importance of the integration of teaching and research in improving the quality of teaching effectiveness and student learning. This institution-wide vision of the importance of student research infuses all our academic divisions: Humanities, Social Sciences, Natural Sciences, and Interdisciplinary Studies.
Colby College also recognizes that liberal arts institutions play a critical role in research training, in creating a scientifically literate society, and in sending students on to careers and graduate programs. Our goal is to offer programs in all departments that are national models for excellence in incorporating research into undergraduate science pedagogy.
Our science faculty will markedly enhance the laboratory component of science courses Colby students must take to fulfill their distributional requirements. These distributional courses will be redesigned focusing on the outcomes and impacts that our faculty believe are vitally important to an excellent undergraduate education. All of the proposed changes will be coordinated across the Natural Sciences Division and sustained after the grant period ends.
Introductory courses are important gateways for science majors, setting the stage for their subsequent course work and research experiences. We believe that introducing students to research methods at this early stage will accelerate the pace at which they undertake independent research projects. Raising the quality of laboratories will be especially effective when coupled with measures to reduce introductory class size.
We propose to develop project courses that will ensure that the Department of Biology, with the largest number of majors on campus, offers capstone research experiences to all its majors. An initial investment from NSF AIRE in physics will also make it possible to incorporate cutting edge experiments into junior-year, project-oriented courses to prepare students for more meaningful senior-year research experiences.
We propose to build on the growth of the interdisciplinary programs at Colby by expanding connections among interdisciplinary and traditional science courses while simultaneously increasing the number of opportunities for independent student research.
A cross-campus seminar series will be held on "Great Ideas/Great Issues in the Sciences."
We will inaugurate an annual Undergraduate Poster Session on campus where students from all disciplines can present their research results.
We also will establish an alumni-based, Natural Sciences Career Network to provide our students with opportunities for internships and employment.
Our proposed outreach activities include augmenting our Partnership for Science Education with local school districts by sharing with K-12 school teachers our approaches to incorporating research into teaching and mechanisms for adapting these approaches to their curriculum.
Colby has a long history of evaluating its programs and disseminating information nationally to scientists and educators. We will continue and augment our already successful assessment strategies.
Our efforts at dissemination will include presentations at meetings, tours and discussion with visiting faculty, sponsoring and participating in several workshops on research in science education, and publications about educational transformations.
Because we believe that periodic strategic planning is a strength of our science program, we will present this model at professional meetings.
A Website will be established to distribute information on the progress of this AIRE grant.