Attention is thought to be the gateway between information and learning, yet there is much we do not understand about how students pay attention in the classroom. Leveraging ideas from cognitive neuroscience and psychology, we explore a framework for understanding attention in the classroom, organized along two key dimensions: internal/external attention and on-topic/off-topic attention. This framework helps us to build new theories for why active-learning strategies are effective teaching tools and how synchronized brain activity across students in a classroom may support learning. These ideas suggest new ways of thinking about how attention functions in the classroom and how different approaches to the same active-learning strategy may vary in how effectively they direct students’ attention. We hypothesize that some teaching approaches are more effective than others because they leverage natural fluctuations in students’ attention. We conclude by discussing implications for teaching and opportunities for future research.

The Current Insights feature is designed to introduce life science educators and researchers to current articles of interest in other social science and education journals. In this installment, I highlight three studies drawing on psychology and learning sciences to understand how to increase student motivation to engage in scientific writing, how drawing can enhance learning, and whether spacing, or distributed practice, matters in actual classes.

Transfer of knowledge from one context to another is one of the paramount goals of education. Educators want their students to transfer what they are learning from one topic to the next, between courses, and into the “real world.” However, it is also notoriously difficult to get students to successfully transfer concepts. This issue is of particular concern in biology and the life sciences, for which transfer of concepts between disciplines is especially critical to understanding. Students not only struggle to transfer concepts like energy from chemistry to biology but also struggle to transfer concepts like chromosome structures in cell division within biology courses. This paper reviews the current research and understanding of transfer from cognitive psychology. We discuss how learner abilities, taught material, and lesson characteristics affect transfer and provide best practices for biology and life sciences education.

To promote undergraduate education reform, teaching professional development (TPD) efforts aim to encourage instructors to adopt evidence-based practices. However, many instructors do not attend TPD. There may be many reasons for this, including low intrinsic motivation to participate in TPD. Psychologists have dealt with motivational barriers in educational contexts using psychosocial interventions, brief activities that draw on a rich history of psychological research to subtly alter key, self-reinforcing psychological processes to yield long-term intrinsic motivation and behavioral changes. Psychosocial interventions, for example, have been used to alter students’ noncognitive attitudes and beliefs, such as attributions and mindset, which positively influence students’ motivation and academic performance. Here, we propose that insights from research on psychosocial interventions may be leveraged to design interventions that will increase instructors’ motivation to participate in TPD, thus enhancing existing pedagogical reform efforts. We discuss psychological principles and “best practices” underlying effective psychosocial interventions that could guide the development of interventions to increase instructors’ motivation to attend TPD. We encourage new interdisciplinary research collaborations to explore the potential of these interventions, which could be a new approach to mitigating at least one barrier to undergraduate education reform.

Cognitive neuroscience research is typically conducted in controlled laboratory environments that hold very little resemblance to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics classrooms. Fortunately, recent advances in portable electroencephalography technology now allow researchers to collect brain data from groups of students in real-world classrooms. Even though this line of research is still new, there is growing evidence that students’ engagement, memory retention, and social dynamics are reflected in the brain-to-brain synchrony between students and teachers (i.e., the similarity in their brain responses). In this Essay, I will provide an overview of this emerging line of research, discuss how this approach can facilitate new collaborations between neuroscientists and discipline-based education researchers, and propose directions for future research.

Recent calls in biology education research (BER) have recommended that researchers leverage learning theories and methodologies from other disciplines to investigate the mechanisms by which students to develop sophisticated ideas. We suggest design-based research from the learning sciences is a compelling methodology for achieving this aim. Design-based research investigates the “learning ecologies” that move student thinking toward mastery. These “learning ecologies” are grounded in theories of learning, produce measurable changes in student learning, generate design principles that guide the development of instructional tools, and are enacted using extended, iterative teaching experiments. In this essay, we introduce readers to the key elements of design-based research, using our own research into student learning in undergraduate physiology as an example of design-based research in BER. Then, we discuss how design-based research can extend work already done in BER and foster interdisciplinary collaborations among cognitive and learning scientists, biology education researchers, and instructors. We also explore some of the challenges associated with this methodological approach.

Two foundational concepts in biology education are 1) offspring are not identical to their parents, and 2) organisms undergo changes throughout their lives. These concepts are included in both international and U.S. curricular standards. Research in psychology has shown that children often have difficulty understanding these concepts, as they are inconsistent with their intuitive theories of the biological world. Additionally, prior research suggests that diagrams are commonly used in instruction and that their features influence student learning. Given this prior work, we explored the characteristics of life cycle diagrams and discuss possible implications for student learning. We examined 75 life cycle diagrams from books, including five biology or general science textbooks and 25 specialized trade books focusing on biology for children. We also examined 633 life cycle diagrams from a publicly available online database of science diagrams. Most diagrams failed to show any within-species variability. Additionally, many diagrams had perceptually rich backgrounds, which prior research suggests might hinder learning. We discuss how the design characteristics of diagrams may reinforce students’ intuitive theories of biology, which might make it difficult for students to understand key biological concepts in the future.

We previously reported that students’ concept-building approaches, identified a priori using a cognitive psychology laboratory task, extend to learning complex science, technology, engineering, and mathematics topics. This prior study examined student performance in both general and organic chemistry at a select research institution, after accounting for preparation. We found that abstraction learners (defined cognitively as learning the theory underlying related examples) performed higher on course exams than exemplar learners (defined cognitively as learning by memorizing examples). In the present paper, we further examined this initial finding by studying a general chemistry course using a different pedagogical approach (process-oriented guided-inquiry learning) at an institution focused on health science majors, and then extended our studies via think-aloud interviews to probe the effect concept-building approaches have on problem-solving behaviors of average exam performance students. From interviews with students in the average-achieving group, using problems at three transfer levels, we found that: 1) abstraction learners outperformed exemplar learners at all problem levels; 2) abstraction learners relied on understanding and exemplar learners dominantly relied on an algorithm without understanding at all problem levels; and 3) both concept-building-approach students had weaknesses in their metacognitive monitoring accuracy skills, specifically their postperformance confidence level in their solution accuracy.

National calls to transform undergraduate classrooms highlight the increasingly interdisciplinary nature of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). As biologists, we use principles from chemistry and physics to make sense of the natural world. One might assume that scientists, regardless of discipline, use similar principles, resources, and reasoning to explain crosscutting phenomena. However, the context of complex natural systems can profoundly impact the knowledge activated. In this study, we used the theoretical lens of framing to explore how experts from different disciplines reasoned about a crosscutting phenomenon. Using interviews conducted with faculty (n = 10) in biology, physics, and engineering, we used isomorphic tasks to explore the impact of item context features (i.e., blood or water) on how faculty framed and reasoned about fluid dynamics, a crosscutting concept. While faculty were internally consistent in their reasoning across prompts, biology experts framed fluid dynamics problems differently than experts in physics and engineering and, as a result, used different principles and resources to reach different conclusions. These results have several implications for undergraduate learners who encounter these cross-disciplinary topics in all of their STEM courses. If each curriculum expects students to develop different reasoning strategies, students may struggle to build a coherent, transferable understanding of crosscutting phenomena.

Cognitive scientists have recommended the use of test-enhanced learning in science classrooms. Test-enhanced learning includes the testing effect, in which learners’ recall of information encountered in testing exceeds that of information not tested. The influence of incentives (e.g., points received) on learners who experience the testing effect in classrooms is less understood. The objective of our study was to examine the effects of incentives in a postsecondary biology course. We administered exams in the course using a quasi-experimental design with low and high point incentives and measured student learning. Although exposure to exams predicted better learning, incentive level did not moderate this effect, an outcome that contradicted recent laboratory findings that higher incentives decreased student recall. We discuss possible explanations of the disparate outcomes as well as the implications for further research on the testing effect in postsecondary biology classrooms.

The testing effect is one of the strongest learning techniques documented to date. Although the effects of testing on high-level learning are promising, fewer studies on this have been done. In this classroom application of the testing effect, we aimed to 1) determine whether a testing effect exists on high-level testing; 2) determine whether higher-level testing has an effect on low-level content retention; and 3) determine whether content knowledge, cognitive skill, or additional components are responsible for this effect. Through a series of two experiments, we confirmed a testing effect on high-level items. However, improved content retention due to testing was not observed. We suggest that this high-level testing effect is due to a better ability to apply specific skills to specific content when this application process has appeared on a previous exam.

Learning objectives (LOs) are statements that typically precede a study session and describe the knowledge students should obtain by the end of the session. Despite their widespread use, limited research has investigated the effect of LOs on learning. In three laboratory experiments, we examined the extent to which LOs improve retention of information. Participants in each experiment read five passages on a neuroscience topic and took a final test that measured how well they retained the information. Presenting LOs before each corresponding passage increased performance on the final test compared with not presenting LOs (experiment 1). Actively presenting LOs increased their pedagogical value: Performance on the final test was highest when participants answered multiple-choice pretest questions compared with when they read traditional LO statements or statements that included target facts (experiment 2). Interestingly, when feedback was provided on pretest responses, performance on the final test decreased, regardless of whether the pretest format was multiple choice or short answer (experiment 3). Together, these findings suggest that, compared with the passive presentation of LO statements, pretesting (especially without feedback) is a more active method that optimizes learning.

Psychological theories of motivation and performance are relevant to teaching and learning in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines. The present study applies Dweck’s mindset theory of motivation to an examination of the relationship among instructor mindset, instructor motivational attitudes, and the use of effective teaching practices. Faculty members who teach undergraduate courses in STEM disciplines completed a survey designed to assess fixed versus growth mindset, mastery orientation (measures of motivation and efficacy), and teaching practices. Results supported a model consistent with Dweck’s theory of motivation, whereby mastery orientation mediates the relationship between instructor mindset and teaching behaviors. It appears that this psychological theory of motivation may be helpful in understanding teaching and learning in STEM disciplines. More research using a variety of measures and teaching contexts is necessary before full applicability can be realized.

The creation and analysis of models is integral to all scientific disciplines, and modeling is considered a core competency in undergraduate biology education. There remains a gap in understanding how modeling activities may support changes in students’ neural representations. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of simulating a model on undergraduates’ behavioral accuracy and neural response patterns when reasoning about biological systems. During brief tutorials, students (n = 30) either simulated a computer model or read expert analysis of a gene regulatory system. Subsequently, students underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging while responding to system-specific questions and system-general questions about modeling concepts. Although groups showed similar behavioral accuracy, the Simulate group showed higher levels of activation than the Read group in right cuneal and postcentral regions during the system-specific task and in the posterior insula and cingulate gyrus during the system-general task. Students’ behavioral accuracy during the system-specific task correlated with lateral prefrontal brain activity independent of instruction group. Findings highlight the sensitivity of neuroimaging methods for identifying changes in representations that may not be evident at the behavioral level. This work provides a foundation for research on how distinct pedagogical approaches may affect the neural networks students engage when reasoning about biological phenomena.

Epistemological beliefs about science (EBAS) or beliefs about the nature of science knowledge, and how that knowledge is generated during inquiry, are an essential yet difficult to assess component of science literacy. Leveraging learning analytics to capture and analyze student practices in simulated or game-based authentic science activities is a potential avenue for assessing EBAS. Our previous work characterized inquiry practices of experts and novices engaged in simulated authentic science inquiry and suggested that practices may reflect EBAS. Here, we extend our prior qualitative work to quantitatively examine differences in practices and EBAS between non–science majors, biology majors, and biology graduates. We observed that inquiry practices of non–science majors and biology graduates were similar to the novice and expert practices, respectively, in our prior work. However, biology majors sometimes appeared to act like their undergraduate peers (e.g., performing fewer planning actions) but other times were more similar to biology graduates (e.g., performing complex investigations). We noted that cognitive constructs like metacognition were also important for understanding which practices were most likely to be reflective of EBAS. This work advances how to assess EBAS using learning analytics and raises questions regarding the development of cognitive processes like EBAS among aspiring biologists.

Undergraduate attrition from science, technology, engineering, and mathematics is well documented and generally intensifies during intermediate years of college. Many contributing factors exist; however, a mismatch between timing of certain pedagogical approaches, such as case-based learning, and the level of students’ cognitive abilities plays a crucial role. Using cognitive load theory as a foundation, we examined relationships between case-based learning versus a traditional lecture and learning gains of undergraduates within an intermediate physiology course. We hypothesized instruction via a case study would provide greater learning benefits over a traditional lecture, with gains possibly tempered by student characteristics like academic preparation, as measured by ACT scores, and academic age, as measured by credit hours completed. Results were surprising. Case-based learning did not guarantee improved learning gains compared with a traditional lecture for all equally. Students with lower ACT scores or fewer credit hours completed had lower learning gains with a case study compared with a traditional lecture. As suggested by cognitive load theory, the amount of extraneous load potentially presented by case-based learning might overwhelm the cognitive abilities of inexperienced students.

Research in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education supports a shift from traditional lecturing to evidence-based instruction in college courses, yet it is unknown whether particular evidence-based pedagogies are more effective than others for learning outcomes like problem solving. Research supports three distinct pedagogies: worked examples plus practice, productive failure, and guided inquiry. These approaches vary in the nature and timing of guidance, all while engaging the learner in problem solving. Educational psychologists debate their relative effectiveness, but the approaches have not been directly compared. In this study, we investigated the impact of worked examples plus practice, productive failure, and two forms of guided inquiry (unscaffolded and scaffolded guidance) on student learning of a foundational concept in biochemistry. We compared all four pedagogies for basic knowledge performance and near-transfer problem solving, and productive failure and scaffolded guidance for far-transfer problem solving. We showed that 1) the four pedagogies did not differentially impact basic knowledge performance; 2) worked examples plus practice, productive failure, and scaffolded guidance led to greater near-transfer performance compared with unscaffolded guidance; and 3) productive failure and scaffolded guidance did not differentially impact far-transfer performance. These findings offer insights for researchers and college instructors.

Experiential learning is an effective educational tool across many academic disciplines, including career development. Nine different institutions bridged by the National Institutes of Health Broadening Experiences in Scientific Training Consortium compared their experiments in rethinking and expanding training of predoctoral graduate students and postdoctoral scholars in the biomedical sciences to include experiential learning opportunities. In this article, we provide an overview of the four types of experiential learning approaches our institutions offer and compare the learning objectives and evaluation strategies employed for each type. We also discuss key factors for shaping experiential learning activities on an institutional level. The framework we provide can help organizations determine which form of experiential learning for career training might best suit their institutions and goals and aid in the successful design and delivery of such training.

Individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and otherwise nonstraight and/or non-cisgender (LGBTQ+) have often not felt welcome or represented in the biology community. Additionally, biology can present unique challenges for LGBTQ+ students because of the relationship between certain biology topics and their LGBTQ+ identities. Currently, there is no centralized set of guidelines to make biology learning environments more inclusive for LGBTQ+ individuals. Rooted in prior literature and the collective expertise of the authors who identify as members and allies of the LGBTQ+ community, we present a set of actionable recommendations to help biologists, biology educators, and biology education researchers be more inclusive of individuals with LGBTQ+ identities. These recommendations are intended to increase awareness of LGBTQ+ identities and spark conversations about transforming biology learning spaces and the broader academic biology community to become more inclusive of LGBTQ+ individuals.

Structural equation modeling is an ideal data analytical tool for testing complex relationships among many analytical variables. It can simultaneously test multiple mediating and moderating relationships, estimate latent variables on the basis of related measures, and address practical issues such as nonnormality and missing data. To test the extent to which a hypothesized model provides an appropriate characterization of the collective relationships among its variables, researchers must assess the “fit” between the model and the sample’s data. However, interpreting estimates of model fit is a problematic process. The traditional inferential test of model fit, the chi-square test, is biased due to sample size. Fit indices provide descriptive (i.e., noninferential) values of model fit (e.g., comparative fit index, root-mean-square error of approximation), but are unable to provide a definitive “acceptable” or “unacceptable” fit determination. Marcoulides and Yuan have introduced an equivalence-testing technique for assessing model fit that combines traditional descriptive fit indices with an inferential testing strategy in the form of confidence intervals to facilitate more definitive fit conclusions. In this paper, we explain this technique and demonstrate its application, highlighting the substantial advantages it offers the life sciences education community for drawing robust conclusions from structural equation models. A structural equation model and data set (N = 1902) drawn from previously published research are used to illustrate how to perform and interpret an equivalence test of model fit using Marcoulides and Yuan’s approach.

In a world of burgeoning societal issues, future scientists must be equipped to work interdisciplinarily to address real-world problems. To train undergraduate students toward this end, practitioners must also have quality assessment tools to measure students’ ability to think within an interdisciplinary system. There is, however, a dearth of instruments that accurately measure this competency. Using a theoretically and empirically based model, we developed an instrument, the Interdisciplinary Science Rubric (IDSR), to measure undergraduate students’ interdisciplinary science thinking. An essay assignment was administered to 102 students across five courses at three different institutions. Students’ work was scored with the newly developed rubric. Evidence of construct validity was established through novice and expert response processes via semistructured, think-aloud interviews with 29 students and four instructors to ensure the constructs and criteria within the instrument were operating as intended. Interrater reliability of essay scores was collected with the instructors of record (κ = 0.67). An expert panel of discipline-based education researchers (n = 11) were consulted to further refine the scoring metric of the rubric. Results indicate that the IDSR produces valid data to measure undergraduate students’ ability to think interdisciplinarily in science.

While interdisciplinary collaboration is desired among researchers, traditional science instruction generally results in science disciplines being taught as separate entities. This study focuses on student understanding of concepts at the intersection of two isolated disciplines—geoscience and bioscience—across two purposeful samples of college-aged students (United States, Germany). Specifically, we explored: 1) how students conceptualize large-scale biologic and geologic changes on Earth over deep time; 2) the relationship between student’s conceptions and their understanding of evolutionary and geologic theories; and 3) how those conceptualizations explicate the need for integration of concepts within school curricula. Students were asked to respond to items about seven major evolutionary events in Earth’s history (biosciences) and perceived changes to Earth’s size and continental positions over time (geosciences). Both groups exhibited difficulties understanding absolute ages in deep time, although Young Earth and Young Life perspectives were present in the U.S. group and absent in the German group. Conceptions about changes to Earth’s size and continental positions over time were consistent across both groups. Findings highlight the need for scientific education instruction in both countries that is interdisciplinary in content.

The flipped classroom has the potential to improve student performance. Because flipping involves both preclass preparation and problem solving in the classroom, the means by which increased learning occurs and whether the method of delivering content matters is of interest. In a partially flipped cell biology course, students were assigned online videos before the flipped class and textbook reading before lectures. Low-stakes assessments were used to incentivize both types of preclass preparation. We hypothesized that more students would watch the videos than read the textbook and that both types of preparation would positively affect exam performance. A multiple linear regression analysis showed that both reading and video viewing had a significant positive impact on exam score, and this model was predictive of exam scores. In contrast to our expectations, most students prepared by both watching videos and reading the textbook and did not exhibit a pattern of solely watching videos. This analysis supports previous findings that engagement with material outside class is partly responsible for the improved outcomes in a flipped classroom and shows that both reading and watching videos are effective at delivering content outside class.

This paper explores the effect of a paired lab course on students’ course outcomes in nonmajors introductory biology at the University of Alaska Anchorage. We compare course completion and final grades for 10,793 students (3736 who simultaneously enrolled in the lab and 7057 who did not). Unconditionally, students who self-select into the lab are more likely to complete the course and to earn a higher grade than students who do not. However, when we condition on observable course, academic, and demographic characteristics, we find much of this difference in student performance outcomes is attributable to selection bias, rather than an effect of the lab itself. The data and discussion challenge the misconception that labs serve as recitations for lecture content, noting that the learning objectives of science labs should be more clearly articulated and assessed independent of lecture course outcomes.

The prevalent stereotype that scientific fields do not afford opportunities to fulfill goals of helping others deters student interest and participation in science. We investigated whether introductory college science textbooks that highlight the prosocial utility value of science can be used to change beliefs about the affordances of scientific work. In study 1, undergraduate students who were randomly assigned to read a science textbook chapter with added prosocial utility value expressed greater beliefs that the science topic afforded prosocial goals and increased interest in the scientific topic, compared with two control conditions. Mediation analysis demonstrated that interest was enhanced through increased beliefs that the topic afforded prosocial opportunities. Multiple group comparison tests indicated that underrepresented minority students (i.e., African Americans, Latinos, and Native Americans) might benefit the most from efforts to strengthen prosocial affordance beliefs. In study 2, we conducted a brief landscape analysis of science textbooks and found that texts are missing opportunities to emphasize the prosocial utility value of science. We discuss recommendations for science educators, curriculum designers, and researchers who want to increase and broaden science participation.

As we strive to make science education more inclusive, more research is needed to fully understand gender gaps in academic performance and in-class participation in the life sciences. Studies suggest that male voices dominate introductory biology courses, but no studies have been done on upper-level courses. Results on achievement gender gaps in biology vary and often conflict, and no studies have been done on the correlation between participation and academic performance gaps. We observed 34 life sciences courses at all levels at a large private university. Overall, males were more likely to participate than their female peers, but these gender gaps varied from class to class. Females participated more in classes in which the instructor called on most hands that were raised or in classes with more females in attendance. Performance gender gaps also varied by classroom, but female final course grades were as much as 0.2 SD higher in classes with a female instructor and/or a female student majority. Gender gaps in participation and final course grades were positively correlated, but this could be solely because female students are more likely to both participate more and earn higher grades in classes with many females in attendance.

The idea of the interaction between genes and environment in the formation of traits is an important component of genetic literacy, because it explains the plastic nature of phenotypes. However, most studies in genetics education characterize challenges in understanding and reasoning about genetic phenomena that do not involve modulation by the environment. Therefore, we do not know enough to inform the development of effective instructional materials that address the influences of environmental factors on genes and traits, that is, phenotypic plasticity. The current study explores college students’ understanding of phenotypic plasticity. We interviewed biological sciences undergraduates who are at different stages of their undergraduate studies and asked them to explain several phenomena that involved phenotypic plasticity. Analysis of the interviews revealed two types of mechanistic accounts: one type described the interaction as involving the environment directly acting on a passive organism; while the other described the interaction as mediated by a sensing-and-responding mechanism. While both accounts are plausible, the second account is critical for reasoning about phenotypic plasticity. We also found that contextual features of the phenomena may affect the type of account generated. Based on these findings, we recommend focusing instruction on the ways in which organisms sense and respond.

Today’s rapidly changing world calls for sustainability-minded scientists who are prepared to solve complex, interconnected problems. Service learning is a pedagogical approach that allows students to engage with the needs of the community by integrating academic work with complex civic issues. Student learning was examined during a short-term service-learning experience focused on water-quality monitoring in an urban watershed to determine whether community-engaged fieldwork in an upper-level ecology lab course enhances sustainability knowledge for future biologists. We used concept map scoring methods and reflection assessments to evaluate and understand changes in the structure and content of student knowledge as a result of the experience. Students showed increases in sustainability knowledge breadth, depth, and complexity, particularly in demonstrating biological–sociological connections. Student reflections indicated most students identified at least one community-engaged serving-learning objective as a result of this experience. These results suggest that community-engaged fieldwork can illustrate ecological and sociological sustainability concepts for students and that engagement works best when we make explicit our objective of engaging communities in the learning process. Short service-learning experiences are effective, can be quickly assessed using concept maps, and can be readily incorporated in other classrooms to enhance sustainability education.

Sense of belonging and involvement has shown to be positively associated with academic achievement and retention. We argue that a focus on sense of belonging and involvement specifically at the departmental level is valuable, yet rarely discussed in the literature. In this article, we describe the development and evaluation of a questionnaire measuring university students’ sense of belonging to and involvement in their “home” department (biology). The questionnaire was named the DeSBI questionnaire (Departmental Sense of Belonging and Involvement) and was administered to students attending an R1 university in the southeastern United States during Spring 2018 (n = 201) and Fall 2018 (n = 737) semesters. Factor analysis indicated a three-factor solution: one factor consisting of five items representing sense of belonging: valued competence; a second factor consisting of six items representing sense of belonging: social acceptance; and a third factor consisting of nine involvement items. Analysis of variance showed significant differences in all subscales between students included in a special biology program, biology majors, and non–biology majors. The study findings support the use of the instrument for measuring biology students’ sense of belonging to and involvement in their biology department.

Science instructors are increasingly incorporating teaching techniques that help students develop core competencies such as critical-thinking and communication skills. These core competencies are pillars of career readiness that prepare undergraduate students to successfully transition to continuing education or the workplace, whatever the field. Course-based undergraduate research experiences that culminate in written research papers can be effective at developing critical-thinking and communication skills but are challenging to implement as class size (and student-to-instructor ratio) grows. We developed a hierarchical mentoring program in which graduate student mentors guided groups of four to five undergraduate students through the scientific process in an upper-level ecology course. Program effectiveness was evaluated by grading final research papers (including previous year papers, before the program was implemented) and surveys (comparing to a course that did not implement the program). Results indicated that primary benefits of hierarchical mentoring were improvements in perceived and demonstrated ability in data analysis and interpretation, leading to a median increase in paper score of ∼10% on a 100-point scale. Future directions indicated by our study were a need to incorporate more approaches (e.g., low-stakes writing exercises) and resources into a revised program to improve outcomes for students whose primary language is not English.

Research has shown that mentorship provided to undergraduate researchers affects the extent of research outcomes. Although a large body of literature focuses on the faculty–undergraduate dyad mentorship structure, little is known about mentoring triads (i.e., interaction among undergraduate students, faculty, and graduate students or postdoctoral associates) or the support provided to early-year undergraduate researchers. Mentors provide various types of support (e.g., intellectual, personal, emotional, and professional support) to undergraduate researchers to increase their engagement in a discipline. This qualitative exploratory study aims to investigate undergraduate researchers’ perspectives on mentoring structures and the support provided to them in their first and sophomore years. The majority of participants described the mentorship they received as having a triad structure, indicating interaction with both faculty and postgraduates. Participants also reported receiving different types of support from faculty and postgraduates depending on their mentoring structures and the amount of research experience they gained. Given the potential benefits to undergraduate researchers, undergraduate research programs should be designed to provide clear roles, responsibilities, and expectations to maximize the support provided to undergraduate students.

In the laboratory-based disciplines, selection of a principal investigator (PI) and research laboratory (lab) indelibly shapes doctoral students’ experiences and educational outcomes. Framed by the theoretical concept of person–environment fit from within a socialization model, we use an inductive, qualitative approach to explore how a sample of 42 early-stage doctoral students enrolled in biological sciences programs made decisions about fitting with a PI and within a lab. Results illuminated a complex array of factors that students considered in selecting a PI, including PI relationship, mentoring style, and professional stability. Further, with regard to students’ lab selection, peers and research projects played an important role. Students actively conceptualized trade-offs among various dimensions of fit. Our findings also revealed cases in which students did not secure a position in their first (or second) choice labs and had to consider their potential fit with suboptimal placements (in terms of their initial assessments). Thus, these students weighted different factors of fit against the reality of needing to secure financial support to continue in their doctoral programs. We conclude by presenting and framing implications for students, PIs, and doctoral programs, and recommend providing transparency and candor around the PI and lab selection processes.

Research skills, especially in experimental design, are essential for success in bioscience doctoral training. While there is a growing body of literature on the development of research skills among science, technology, engineering, and mathematics doctoral students, very little is specific to biosciences. We seek to address this gap by characterizing aptitude and self-perceived facility with research skills among incoming bioscience doctoral students, as well as how and why they change over the first semester of doctoral training. Our results reveal variability in research skills self-efficacy and a wide range in aptitude and self-perceived facility with experimental design at the beginning of the semester, both of which are uncorrelated with the duration of predoctoral research experience. We found that students significantly improved in both experimental design performance and research skills self-efficacy over their first semester; students attributed their experience and comfort with experimental design to a variety of factors, including laboratory research, course work, mentoring, and interaction with colleagues. Notably, we found that the largest research skills self-efficacy gains were aligned with material that was covered in students’ first-year course work about experimental design. Together, these results demonstrate the importance of explicit training in experimental design and other research skills early in bioscience doctoral training.

Graduate students represent both a significant component of the instructional team for biology departments as well as being students themselves learning to become academics. However, little is known about how biology graduate students perceive the relationships among their academic roles, particularly research and teaching. The present study used a cross-sectional survey to elicit the perceptions biology graduate students hold about the relationship between research and teaching. This work is an important first step in understanding the socialization processes of graduate students. Findings indicated that the majority of biology graduate students (65.5% of n = 255) hold synergistic perceptions of research and teaching. This is in spite of the mixed messages that biology graduate students hear about this relationship, including both “Teaching detracts from research” and “Teaching supports research.” Findings from this study have implications for multiple stakeholders in graduate education, including professional developers who need to be cognizant of the messages that are received and internalized by biology graduate students while engaged in professional development opportunities. Results also suggest that work is needed to address how messages are prioritized and internalized during graduate school.

Over the past decades, two persisting priorities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) training have been: 1) increasing the knowledge of and access to careers beyond academic scientist; and 2) increasing the diversity of the STEM workforce. Previous studies show that a uniquely constructed career coaching group provides strong support and progress for both priorities. This report extends this design into a more sustainable model that is positioned within the professional context of rising young scientists. This new model is based in the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (ASPET)—the ASPET Mentoring Network. Groups of PhD students and postdocs were assigned to an ASPET professional (academic or other career) member (the coach) with an initial meeting held the day before the society’s annual meeting. The coaching groups interacted during the meeting and then virtually for a year. Extensive survey and interview evaluation data gathered from the first three cohorts (12 coaching groups) in 2016– 2018 provided strong evidence of the perceived and real benefits of the network. This new version of career coaching groups is both feasible and linked to career success due to its close association with a scientific society, peers, and coaches who share scientific identities and aspirations.

The phenomenon of embedding Science Faculty with Education Specialties (SFES) in science departments is well documented. However, the perspectives of academic leaders have not been systematically studied. To investigate these perspectives, we conducted an interview study of college of science deans in the California State University system, which offers a defined higher education context in which to sample across a range of institution types and cultures. While deans were aware of and positive about SFES as potential change agents, most deans also evidenced casual bias against science education efforts and experts. Deans mentioned that education reform efforts by SFES were primarily driven by external policy and funding mandates, causing concern that support for such positions and scholarly work could evaporate if external pressures recede. The majority of deans stated that the SFES phenomenon had persisted over the last decade and continued to grow. Findings reported here document tacit assumptions that science education efforts may not count as science and reveal a lack of cultural integration of science education efforts into the sciences in higher education. Such findings should give biology educators, reformers, and researchers pause, as well as fresh incentive to engage more fully and regularly with administrators about their work.