StressCURE: A Course-based Undergraduate Research Experience Toolkit for Creating Laboratory Courses That Investigate Biological Stress in the Roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans

This project aims to serve the national interest by building and supporting undergraduate research experiences in life science laboratory courses that more closely mimic authentic research experiences. Access to undergraduate research experiences is sometimes limited to students advantaged with prior research experience or higher academic achievement.

By incorporating research experiences into laboratory courses, students learn laboratory skills and acquire valuable academic traits including persistence, problem-solving, teamwork, and self-efficacy. This project seeks to develop a series of teaching tools that will attract faculty to adopt the course-based undergraduate research experience model in a wide variety of laboratory courses serving first through fourth-year students.

The project team will investigate the efficacy of the materials created, the outcomes of faculty adoption of this teaching method, and changes in student and faculty attitudes post-adoption. The significance of this study is that it has the potential to increase adoption of course-based undergraduate research projects and increase student resilience and self-driven learning, thereby increasing the retention of students in STEM courses.

The goal of this project is to increase student participation in undergraduate research by facilitating faculty adoption of a course-based undergraduate research experience in their laboratory courses. To accomplish this, faculty from six diverse institutions plan to develop modules of laboratory exercises and sort them by discipline enabling faculty to quickly identify and adopt protocols appropriate to their interests, budget, equipment, and facilities, and facilitate student-generated lines of investigation.

The project team plans to disseminate the products of this work by attending and presenting at various professional society meetings, by participating in each society’s educational community, by publishing the modules on the project’s website, and by publishing outcomes of the project in peer-reviewed literature. In the final year of the project, the team intends to host a regional conference for faculty from primarily undergraduate institutions to further facilitate adoption for faculty from institutions that do not regularly attend larger scientific conferences and to facilitate the building of a regional community of practice.

Within the scope of this project are planned assessments of both student and faculty materials. Student exit surveys and student artifacts will help determine the impacts of this project on changes in student affective learning outcomes regarding science and the scientific method, the development of critical thinking skills, and student growth in science literacy and communication.

Faculty surveys, website metrics, and interaction in the project’s community of practice will be used to assess the efficacy of modules, ease of adoption, faculty willingness to adopt this evidence-based style of teaching, and faculty participation in research. This research proposal has the potential to enhance understanding of barriers to adoption of course-based undergraduate research experiences and the efficacy of means to overcome those barriers while increasing student retention and success in STEM courses throughout their four-year education.

It also has the potential to encourage the creation of similar modular-based laboratory experiences based on other model organisms and scientific problems, thereby increasing adoption of this evidence-based and inclusive educational practice to a wider audience. The NSF IUSE: EDU Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students.

Through the Engaged Student Learning track, this program supports the creation, exploration, and implementation of promising practices and tools.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.