Education Commons^™

Student Success Of Online Vs. In-Person Biology Courses At Virginia Community Colleges, Jennifer Claire Scott

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Community colleges have a significant role in preparing students for STEM-related careers through certificates, degrees, and transfers to four-year institutions. In addition, online education is a growing mode of higher education, particularly for community college students. However, community college and online students are both at a high risk of attrition and show a lower success rate for degree completion. The purpose of this study was to identify differences in attrition and success between students in online and in-person biology courses at Virginia community colleges. Also, this study addressed downstream effects of online education by examining course completion of second-semester biology …

Fourteen Recommendations To Create A More Inclusive Environment For Lgbtq+ Individuals In Academic Biology, Katelyn M. Cooper, Anna Jo J. Auerbach, Jordan D. Bader, Amy S. Beadles-Bohling, Jacqueline A. Brashears, Erica Cline, Sarah L. Eddy, Deanna B. Elliott, Elijah Farley, Linda Fuselier, Heather M. Heinz, Madison Irving, Tanya Josek, A. Kelly Lane, Stanley M. Lo, Jeffrey Maloy, Michelle Nugent, Erika Offerdahl, Juan Palacios-Moreno, Jorge Ramos, Joshua W. Reid, Rachel A. Sparks, Ashley L. Waring, Mike Wilton, Cara Gormally, Sara E. Brownell

Publications and Research

Individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and otherwise non-straight 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 …

Effect Of Hypothesis Type On Scientific Literacy In Nonscience Majors, Sharon Schmidt, Leanne Davis, Danyelle N. Dehner-Aganovic, Margaret (Meg) Smith

Georgia Journal of Science

The University System of Georgia has undergone nine consolidations of institutions of higher education in the past seven years. One consequence of a consolidation is that faculty from historically different institutions are brought together to work in newly-created units, and this requires merging of ideas, particularly at the departmental level. In the Department of Biology of our own institution, this manifested as differences in the types of hypotheses taught in nonmajors classes in which scientific literacy is a learning outcome of high priority. Data can be useful for resolving such differences, but there was limited data on the effect of …

An Investigation Of The Impacts Of Traditional, Virtual, And Hybrid Biological Laboratories On College Students’ Achievement And Motivation To Learn Biology, Shavonda Jackson

Dissertations

Virtual courses function in a different manner than traditional courses, therefore they require teaching methods and assessment techniques geared specifically to maximize this learning experience. Internet-based learning and distance-education are no longer new concepts in the science field. Because of this, many collegiate biology programs have created courses that can be taken virtual or hybrid. A number of experimental studies have had great influence in terms of the effects and impacts of educational technology in relation to virtual laboratories.

However, not many studies emphasize the impact of hybrid laboratories on student achievement or assess students’ motivation to learn in a …