Are Today's Biology Faculty Ready To Shape The Future?

This is a time of great ferment in education in the life sciences. The students we educate today are the voting citizens of tomorrow. Their attitudes toward and knowledge about the life sciences will determine the basis for future support of the discipline. New technologies offer faculty and students new ways to learn. The K-12 community's adoption of the recommendations from the National Research Council's National Science Education Standards, with their renewed emphasis on process and concepts, promises to produce students with different attitudes toward science and new approaches to learning the disciplines. The interest of the public and of entering college freshmen is high in the life sciences. How can undergraduate biology faculty respond to these challenges and opportunities? One year ago, a special advisory committee to the Education and Human Resources Directorate of the National Science Foundation released a report titled Shaping the Future: New Expectations for Undergraduate Education in Science, Mathematics, Engineering, and Technology (http://www.ehr.nsf.gov/ehr/due/documents/review/96139/start.htm ). The report was the result of a year-long study of the current status of undergraduate education. The review incorporated input from a variety of stakeholders, including faculty members, administrators, students, recent graduates, parents, industry, and representatives from government. The committee, chaired by Melvin George, the current president of the University of Missouri, urged in its report that "all students have access to supportive, excellent undergraduate education in science, mathematics, engineering, and technology, and that all students learn through direct experience with the methods and processes of inquiry." Although Shaping the Future discussed all of undergraduate science and math, the message is very timely for life scientists. Biology enrollments are continuing to soar across the United States. Between 1988 and 1994, undergraduate enrollments in biology courses rose by 70 percent, and the trend seems to be continuing. Although the inherent interest of students in biology may have something to do with this trend, it is more likely that perceived job prospects in biotechnology, health care, and the environment are driving enrollments. The recommendations of Shaping the Future focused on courses such as introductory biology, following which students make crucial choices about majors and careers and gain a sense of what science is and what scientists do. For many, these are the only undergraduate science courses they will ever take. Of equal importance to the dramatic rise of biology majors is the disproportionately large role played by biology in the general education of nonscience majors, including prospective teachers in grades K-12. Within this group, the science education of future elementary schoolteachers is particularly important. For many of these teachers, the limited amount of college-level science and math that they learn is acquired within the two-year college system before transferring to a four-year institution to finish their education, thus the compelling need to pay careful attention to biology courses at two-year institutions. Why the emphasis on K-12 teachers? Department of Education statistics show that in the next eight years, approximately 2 million new teachers will be hired. What will be the quality of their math and science preparation? Don't biology faculty have an obligation to educate these new teachers using methods of inquiry that they can then model for their students? To emphasize the importance of this effort, remember that most high school students take biology, but for more than half of these students, this experience is the last course in science they will ever take. The focus groups taking part in the review that lead to Shaping the Future discussed the numerous problems in undergraduate science education. The participants reported: faculty who often are uninterested in teaching, perhaps because their rewards and promotion are based on their research efforts and not on their teaching; reliance on ineffective lecture styles in very large introductory courses that had a "weed-out" atmosphere; an emphasis on "covering the material"; courses unsuited to the needs of nonscience majors; and few laboratory-based courses, which often had demonstration-based "cookbook" laboratories. The report recommended the adoption of proven, successful pedagogical approaches for improved student learning, which include more collaborative and active learning. Faculty should introduce concepts by examining current issues and problems familiar to most undergraduates. They should place a greater emphasis on teaching concepts and the processes of science rather than simply the factual content. For example, students should learn how to pose a researchable question or do an experiment. When appropriate, faculty should make more effective use of technology, not as a substitute for faculty contact but as an aid to increased communication and learning. Laboratories should emphasize discovery, and courses should be inquiry-based. Faculty should strive to bring the excitement of their research into their teaching, especially into introductory biology and courses for nonmajors. The report also made specific recommendations for faculty and departments, administrations, business and industry, professional and scientific societies, and accrediting and testing agencies. It recommended that NSF lead development of a common agenda for improving science education and place the highest priority on implementation of the most effective techniques and programs of K-12 teacher preparation, undergraduate faculty enhancement, and institutional reform. In addition, the report recommended that NSF lead development of a research program focused on understanding human learning in order to inform our teaching practices and to support the integration of research and education at the undergraduate level. NSF was charged with assisting institutions in such areas as changing the faculty reward system and improving pedagogical methodology; correcting underrepresentation and supporting outreach activities that bring science to the public; and finally, accepting leadership of the efforts necessary to implement the recommendations made. When groups of biologists get together to discuss issues of pedagogy, the complaints are common: too many students and too little personnel support with budgets, equipment, and facilities that don't provide adequate laboratories. Faculty feel constrained to present students with enormous volumes of information to help "prepare" them for the Medical College Admissions Test or the Graduate Record Examination. There is no agreed-upon set of concepts, processes, or topics for either the introductory or the major courses. On many campuses, a disagreement exists as to whether there should be separate courses for non-majors or for prospective K-12 teachers. Joseph Pelliccia is an associate professor in the department of biology at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine. He is on temporary assignment to the National Science Foundation's Division of Undergraduate Education. E-mail: jpellicc@nsf.gov. The views expressed in this article represent those of the author and not the National Science Foundation. Despite these widely acknowledged problems, there has been little agreement on the need for or the direction of fundamental reform in undergraduate biology, especially at the introductory level. Questions that all life-science faculty must answer include: What unique strengths does biology have that makes it the favored choice of students fulfilling general education requirements for their limited undergraduate science experience? What do biology faculty emphasize in our courses for this group? Do students learn the process of science, such as how to do experiments, or are they just inundated with terminology and facts? Are faculty aware that only some of the students sitting in their classes will be going on to major in biology, or to a career in biology or a health-related field? Have faculty ensured that their curricula for majors are up-to-date and informed by the latest research? And, since enrollments are so high and are still climbing, have faculty thought about the innovative strategies and pedagogies required to deal with the strain of bulging classrooms and declining resources? Compounding the lack of commonality in approach or curriculum is the specialized nature of the professional scientific societies representing the life sciences that many faculty use to define themselves professionally and that publish their research efforts. There is no society that has as its central focus the undergraduate educational experience in biology. Although it is now becoming common for there to be education sessions and workshops at most biology meetings, there is little or no coordination of these efforts. This makes it difficult for a leadership group to coalesce, which could help formulate the responses of biologists to the changes seen in our classrooms. Such coordination is critical if reform of introductory courses and courses for non-science majors is to occur. Most biology faculty would agree that there is an urgent need for improvement. What steps should be taken now, to begin this process? Would it be useful for selected members of the major biology societies to get together to discuss how their disciplines can inform the restructuring and improvement of introductory biology and courses for non-majors? Should the education chairs of the various societies meet to coordinate their activities? These issues deserve a public discussion. Concerned faculty can find help in achieving the important pedagogical goals of making our courses and curricula more engaging and up-to-date, as a large amount of very good work has been done. Besides Shaping the Future, faculty can look to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Beyond Bio101: The Interactive Lab Manual (http://www.hhmi.org/BeyondBio101/ucsd.htm ) and the National Research Council's Science Teaching Reconsidered: A Handbook (http://www.nap.edu/readingroom/books/str/) and recommendations for National Science Education Standards (http://www.nap.edu/readingroom/books/nses/). The National Association of Biology Teachers' Web site (http://www.nabt.org/) is another source rich with ideas and examples. Project Kaleidoscope, a multidisciplinary organization devoted to hosting undergraduate science and math faculty enhancement workshops, maintains a list of proven ideas called Programs that Work (http://www.pkal.org/). In addition to the resources listed above, NSF's Division of Undergraduate Education offers four programs that can help address these critical issues and enhance student learning. The Advanced Technological Education Program focuses on the education of the technician as prepared by U.S. two-year colleges. Collaboratives for Excellence in Teacher Preparation has as its focus the preparation of excellent K-12 mathematics and science teachers. The program will also support single-component projects in addition to large collaborative efforts. The Instrumentation and Laboratory Improvement program supports the development of new or improved laboratory and field courses, while the Course and Curriculum Development program supports the production of new and innovative educational materials and curricula. Will undergraduate biology education in the future meet the growing challenge of a changing student population (older, more diverse, more likely to be working part-time or full-time), a rapidly growing knowledge base, and new ideas concerning how students learn? The readers of this publication will help determine the success of this effort.

Are Today's Biology Faculty Ready To Shape The Future?

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