Wagner-Coello Helen Urpi, Villar Maria Elena, DeGennaro Matthew
Department of Biological Sciences, Florida International University, Miami, FL 33199 USA.
Biomolecular Sciences Institute, Florida International University, Miami, FL 33199 USA.
Discov Educ. 2024;3(1):191. doi: 10.1007/s44217-024-00293-6. Epub 2024 Oct 21.
Citizen science is recognized as an important tool to engage the public in important scientific and environmental issues that impact them. Mosquito surveillance-based citizen science in college curricula have not received much attention even though its usage has the potential to actively engage students in inquiry and elevate student support for science. FLAGG (Florida Genome Group) was a course-based internship where college students engaged in mosquito egg collections, learned about disease transmission, and gained an understanding of data collection in scientific research. This paper reports on a study comparing the outcomes of FLAGG participants with students in other college internships and students who had never done an internship. Findings show that participation in the citizen science mosquito control internship not only increased knowledge and skills in mosquito abatement, but also increased confidence and to a certain extent, sense of engagement, when compared to other groups. These results support the inclusion of citizen science methods in college-based curricula, where benefits extend beyond content learning.
The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s44217-024-00293-6.
公民科学被视为让公众参与影响他们的重要科学和环境问题的重要工具。尽管基于蚊子监测的公民科学在大学课程中的应用有可能让学生积极参与探究并提高学生对科学的支持度，但它在大学课程中并未受到太多关注。佛罗里达基因组小组（FLAGG）是一个基于课程的实习项目，大学生参与蚊子卵采集，了解疾病传播，并对科学研究中的数据收集有了认识。本文报告了一项将FLAGG参与者的成果与其他大学实习学生以及从未参加过实习的学生进行比较的研究。研究结果表明，与其他组相比，参与公民科学灭蚊实习不仅增加了灭蚊方面的知识和技能，还增强了自信心，并在一定程度上提高了参与感。这些结果支持将公民科学方法纳入大学课程，其益处不仅限于内容学习。
在线版本包含可在10.1007/s44217-024-00293-6获取的补充材料。
