González-Del Pino Gonzalo L, Rokop Megan E
Department of Molecular Biology and Microbiology, Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Honors College, University of Massachusetts Boston, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Biochem Mol Biol Educ. 2024 Nov-Dec;52(6):676-688. doi: 10.1002/bmb.21858. Epub 2024 Aug 9.
In a typical undergraduate biology curriculum, students do not dive into research until they first wade through large amounts of content. Biology courses in the first few years of the college curriculum tend to be lecture-based and exam-based courses. As a result, science students are mainly exposed to content knowledge-not the skills scientists practice daily. While students may practice manual techniques in lab sections of lecture courses, the higher-level analytical research skills are reserved for the final semesters of college. To address this issue, we created an undergraduate cell biology course centered around practicing research skills, and fully accessible to students with no prerequisite content knowledge. In our course, students read primary literature (no textbooks) and were assessed by writing 12 analytical response papers and a full research proposal (no exams). Each student chose a topic for their semester-long project, conducted a literature review, and proposed future experiments-all in a stepwise fashion with plentiful feedback. The students' thorough comprehension of the primary literature, along with successful completion of the research proposals, shows that the course achieved its goals of building these skills-even in the nonbiology majors taking this pilot course. Pre- and post-survey results demonstrate that students gained feelings of confidence and preparedness for future research experiences. We envision a future model in which such a skills-based course replaces a more traditional cell biology course, giving students the opportunity to practice high-level analytical research skills from very early on in the undergraduate biology curriculum.
在典型的本科生物学课程中，学生在首次深入大量内容之前不会涉足研究。大学课程头几年的生物学课程往往是以讲座和考试为主的课程。因此，理科学生主要接触的是内容知识，而不是科学家日常实践的技能。虽然学生可能会在讲座课程的实验环节中练习手工技术，但更高层次的分析研究技能则留到大学的最后几个学期。为了解决这个问题，我们创建了一门本科细胞生物学课程，该课程以实践研究技能为核心，没有必备内容知识的学生也完全可以学习。在我们的课程中，学生阅读原始文献（没有教科书），并通过撰写12篇分析性回应论文和一份完整的研究计划来进行评估（没有考试）。每个学生为他们为期一学期的项目选择一个主题，进行文献综述，并提出未来的实验——所有这些都以循序渐进的方式进行，并得到大量反馈。学生对原始文献的透彻理解，以及研究计划的成功完成，表明该课程实现了培养这些技能的目标，即使是参加这门试点课程的非生物学专业学生也是如此。课前和课后调查结果表明，学生对未来的研究经历有了信心和准备。我们设想了一个未来模式，在这个模式中，这样一门以技能为基础的课程将取代更传统的细胞生物学课程，让学生有机会在本科生物学课程的早期就开始实践高层次的分析研究技能。
