Other Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Surveying First-Year Stem Students’ Self-Reported Knowledge, Skills, And Attitudes Towards Teamwork, Gregory R. Goldsmith, Camilla Acosta

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

The ability to work in a team is cited as a key outcome for many undergraduate Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) programs, both as a method for improving learning and as a highly desired trait for employers. Despite a growing focus on teamwork, our ability to design appropriate teamwork curriculum is limited by our poor understanding of what students arriving at university know about teamwork, what teamwork skills they consider themselves to possess, and their attitudes towards teamwork. We delivered a mixed-methods survey to first-year STEM undergraduate students (n = 205) to benchmark knowledge, skills and attitudes towards …

Writing Climate Change: Science Knowledge In Creative Forms; Part Two: From Reading To Writing, Lytton Smith

Climate Change and the Individual, 2025-26

This lesson explores how a short creative piece by Ada Limón, U.S. Poet Laureate, draws on climate science knowledge to engage readers informationally, imaginatively, and emotionally. Students will reflect through discussion and/or writing on both the scientific methodology and the questions of equity and justice her poem raises. Finally, students will engage in a guided writing prompt where they research science knowledge around climate change and use what they find to shape their own short creative pieces (100-300 words), based in that science.

Writing Climate Change: Science Knowledge In Creative Forms; Part One: Understanding Science Stories, Lytton Smith

Climate Change and the Individual, 2025-26

This lesson explores how a short creative piece by Ada Limón, U.S. Poet Laureate, draws on climate science knowledge to engage readers informationally, imaginatively, and emotionally. Students will reflect through discussion and/or writing on both the scientific methodology and the questions of equity and justice her poem raises. Finally, students will engage in a guided writing prompt where they research science knowledge around climate change and use what they find to shape their own short creative pieces (100-300 words), based in that science.

Splish-Splash: Center Of Mass, Stability, And A Fun Pool Toy, Seth Ashman

Engineering & Physics Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Probing Consciousness, Samia Bouzid

Capstones

For centuries, the study of consciousness remained the purview of philosophers, spiritualists and religious leaders. But in the 1980s, the co-discoverer of the double-helix, James Crick, initiated a quest for a scientific explanation for consciousness — in a secret club. In the decades that followed, consciousness gained ground as a respectable area of scientific study, in fields such as neuroscience, artificial intelligence and physics. Yet, the more scientists learn about consciousness, the more it calls into question our fundamental assumptions about the way the world works. https://samiabouzid.atavist.com/probing-consciousness

Family-Friendly Science: Increasing Family Engagement In Stem Education, Alison Bixler

Honors Projects

Family engagement is vital to a child’s success in his or her academic career. Current research has focused more specifically on the relationship between parent engagement in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education and a student’s success in his or her STEM education. This paper is a summary of present research pertaining to this topic, as well as a summary of the results of a field-based study the author and faculty mentors completed to learn more about methods for engaging families in STEM education, particularly in the area of science. Present research indicates that a successful method for engaging …

Assessment Of Silk Degradation Using Pyrolysis, Conor Makepeace

Honors Projects in Science and Technology

The purpose of this research is to investigate the molecular constitution of silk and the specific causes of post-production degradation in silk material. This capstone project focused specifically on the conditions and degradation of ancient Chinese silk products provided by the Chinese National Silk Museum. Modern silk products were artificially degraded and compared to the ancient silk using Py-GC-MS and comparative analytic techniques. This investigation revealed that the ancient silk products most likely underwent degradation in elevated temperatures while in the presence of moisture and the absence of sunlight or UV radiation during long term burial.

Product Review: Knimbus: Free Personal Edition, Laura Pope Robbins

Publications

Laura Pope Robbins is an advisor for The Charleston Advisor, and the review below is included in Scholarly Commons with the permission of the publisher.

Knimbus is both a search engine and a collaborative platform for scientists to find the information they need and connect them with other researchers in their field. As a search engine it provides a federated search of 32 Open Access resources and connects the researcher to the full text. As a collaborative platform, it provides a way for scientists to upload their documents and share them with their colleagues. Knimbus is an enterprising project that …

Trends. Science Is Apolitical As Political, Ibpp Editor

International Bulletin of Political Psychology

This Trends article discusses the nature of science from a political psychological perspective.