Education & Training
STEM field-to-field transitions for a better workforce
A new scheme called OPEN-NJ at Montclair State University (MSU) means more students will be able to gain interdisciplinary research skills by transitioning from Biology to Chemistry or Biochemistry subjects for graduate-level study. Students in New Jersey with an interdisciplinary education are at an advantage when entering the STEM workforce because the state is home to some biochemical industry giants. […]
Concept mapping as a learning strategy: Impact on undergraduate biology students’ achievement, self-efficacy, and metacognition
Concept mapping is an active learning technique that involves representing connections between ideas in a diagrammatic way. Director of the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning at Morgan State University, Dr Catherine Martin-Dunlop has been carrying out research into the learning strategy to confirm whether it could be the key to improving the academic performance, self-efficacy and metacognitive skills of, […]
Flipping the script: Leveraging leadership development training in young athletes
A free online captain’s training course is teaching high school athletes how to become effective team leaders. By introducing a “flipped classroom” approach to supplement the course, Jedediah E. Blanton and his colleagues at the University of Tennessee have helped students transfer these leadership assets to their teams, and to other areas of their life. Drawing upon over ten years of […]
Increasing personalisation in scientific college courses
In the U.S., women and minorities are severely underrepresented in the science, technology, engineering, and maths (STEM) workforce. Nationwide, and only 40% of students who enrol in a STEM course complete their training. Dr Aditi Pai is exploring the challenge of making undergraduate biology more engaging with the aim of increasing student success. Instead of the traditional approach which uses textbook […]
Can training for ethics in STEM benefit the workforce?
The ethics in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (E-STEM) programme is a National Science Foundation (NSF) funded project at Gwynedd Mercy University, Greater Philadelphia. Dr Michelle Kulp McEliece and her colleagues, Dr Christian Hellings and Tara White Hines, created the programme in response to research which suggests that a focus on ethics in STEM can foster the ability of students […]
I-Engineering: Middle-school engineering with communities
Equity in STEM subjects throughout school, higher education and work is yet to be achieved and in particular, certain minority groups and girls remain under-represented in middle-school engineering. The I-Engineering project is looking to a new justice-oriented approach to learning; by combining community ethnography with technical knowledge the project hopes to engage minoritized youth and show them how they can […]
Oral rehearsal: Teaching English as a foreign language in Japan
Teaching second languages is big business, and the biggest second language of all is English. Language teaching methods have come a long way in the last century, and in Japan Associate Professor Mutsuko Nagasaki (English Education Centre, Ehime University) has been looking into how ‘oral rehearsal’ at home might supplement classroom learning and improve second language communication and ability in […]
Going global: How a Japanese University is revolutionising English-language learning
As the process of globalisation continues to interconnect the Earth’s people, the ability to communicate effectively has become integral to the development of partnerships and relationships all over the world. Toward such means and ends, the teaching of English – as the defacto lingua franca – has become paramount. In Japan, Hiroshima University (HU) is at the forefront of global education […]
Culturally-relevant chemistry for American Indian students
American Indian students in the USA are under-represented in all science and engineering fields by up to a half. To find ways to bring cultural relevance to American Indian students, Professor Mark Griep and his colleagues Beverly R. DeVore-Wedding, Janyce Woodard and Hank Miller are indigenizing chemistry courses at two tribal colleges in Nebraska. By focusing on laboratory experiences, their […]
Gender and visuospatial processing in multimedia STEM learning
Multimedia learning research comparing effectiveness of static and dynamic visualisations in STEM disciplines has revealed mixed results, because it has ignored gender distribution among its participants. Although research is suggestive for gender differences in visuospatial processing, the failure to report gender compositions in many studies makes it impossible to draw conclusions on the moderating effects of these differences on learning. […]