Objectives  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  

1.  Establish a regional coalition of Florida faculty, engaged in a partnership with Archbold Biological Station, to implement and sustain reform in undergraduate science education in their colleges and universities.     

1. Assemble institutional teams

                                                               i.      Get 4-5 teams from FL institutions with  4-5 participants each.

                                                             ii.      Provide ideas for recruitment with a focus on Community Colleges.

2. Hold two workshops per year

                                                               i.      Ensure that a critical mass of attendees is present from each IT

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2. Use the facilities and field sites at Archbold to enable faculty to gain further experience in teaching strategies for student-centered learning.        
1. Faculty develop teaching strategies using workshop materials, literature, web resources, and collaboration with other FIRST II team members

                                                               i.      What we taught - Develop workshops that model and examine teaching strategies and allow participants to pose interesting questions in the field.. Provide a repertoire of strategies for teaching strategies (cooperative learning, inquiry-based learning, active learning, etc.). Provide reference materials about teaching strategies

                                                             ii.      What they did

                                                            iii.      Degree to which implemented

2. Enhance the ability to convey complex concepts in field biology to a wide variety of classes from introductory to upper level.

                                                               i.      Develop action plans for implementing student-centered teaching at home institution

3. Institutional teams establish mechanisms for providing peer support and review of teaching strategies

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3. Work with faculty to develop and use learning goals and assessments.
1. Faculty develop learning goals using workshop materials, literature, web resources, and collaboration with other FIRST II team members

                                                               i.      What we taught - Develop workshops that model and examine goals and assessments etc  Provide reference materials about teaching strategies

                                                             ii.      What they did

                                                            iii.      Degree to which implemented

2. Faculty develop assessments using workshop materials, literature, web resources, and collaboration with other FIRST II team members

                                                               i.      What we taught

                                                             ii.      What they did

                                                            iii.      Degree to which implemented

3. Institutional teams establish mechanisms for providing peer support and review of learning goals and assessments
4. Evaluate, where possible, student learning in classes as a result of faculty participating in FIRST.II

                                                               i.      Evaluate the degree of implementation in the classroom.

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4. Promote general faculty and student interest in Florida ecosystems and species by increasing participant understanding of Florida ecosystems, encouraging faculty and institutional interest to use field stations and field sites such as Archbold as teaching forums.
1. Learn about Archbold Biological Station resources for teaching, specifically Florida scrub ecosystem
2. Faculty increase their use of Archbold Biological Station as a teaching resource

                                                               i.      Increase course content about FL ecosystems

                                                             ii.      Increase number and breadth of field experiences/field trips faculty include as part of their coursework.

                                                            iii.      Increase number and breadth of field experiences/field trips faculty home institutions include and/or require as part of overall student learning.

3. Increase student knowledge about and awareness of Florida ecosystems
4. Interact with Archbold Biological Station staff
5. Learn about teaching resources available within the national network of field stations and marine labs.

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5. Facilitate collaboration among participating faculty about their reforms towards achieving excellence in science teaching
1. Between workshops develop a network of support for individual team members, IT teams, and IT institutions.

                                                               i.      Seek feedback from participants regarding their preferred communication (i.e., list serve, bulletin board, monthly phone calls, brown bag lunches, etc.) within and among teams.

                                                             ii.      Invite faculty and upper administration to brown bag lunches that share information from Project FIRST.II

                                                            iii.      Invite other FIRST.II IT members to brown bag lunches

                                                           iv.      Archbold Biological Station builds website and posts all FIRST.II materials

                                                             v.      Participate in regular interactions with ITs.

                                                           vi.      Commitment to within IT schedule of regular meetings and interactions.

2. Increase collaboration among team members in their teaching.

                                                               i.      Implement ways to increase collaboration such as joint teaching efforts, peer review of teaching materials within institutional teams, guest lectures, co-taught courses, etc.

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6. Promote support for the emerging criteria and strategies for the scholarship of teaching at participant’s home institutions, so that teaching can be recognized, evaluated, and rewarded within institutions.
1. Use FIRST.II to promote reviews of departmental teaching goals, curriculum, and science teaching with a view to reforming science teaching.

                                                               i.      Invite faculty and upper administration to brown bag lunches that share information from Project FIRST.II

                                                             ii.      Promote methods for sharing information with team members who miss workshops.

                                                            iii.      Write FIRST.II articles for campus/faculty university newsletters

                                                           iv.      Invite success stories from other national FIRST teams to share at symposiums and brown bag lunches.

                                                             v.      Archbold Biological Station provides resources (RFPs, support, etc.) to find funding opportunities for curriculum/undergraduate enhancement.

                                                           vi.      Work with departmental colleagues to submit proposal to funding agency (e.g., NSF EHR CCLI) for curriculum/undergraduate enhancement.

2. Provide mentoring and peer review among team members in their teaching activities for the promotion process.

                                                               i.      Determine faculty participants are coming up for tenure review and provide support

                                                             ii.      Interact with teaching assistant training and provide mentoring to TAs in departments with ideas from FIRST.II

                                                            iii.      Interact with first year faculty members and provide mentoring with ideas from FIRST.II

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7. Support a national dissemination network to sustain improvement in teaching initiated by faculty
1. Provide information to FIRST.II national network

                                                               i.      Web site

                                                             ii.      Newsletter etc

                                                            iii.      Participate in annual review, telephone calls and site visit by Jan Hodder and/or Diane Ebert-May

2. Communicate with other FIRST.II regional teams (e.g., Hancock, SDSU, Akron)

                                                               i.      Keep up to date with the resources on FIRST.II website

                                                             ii.      Go to other FIRST II workshops

                                                            iii.      Monthly communication with Jan Hodder and Diane Ebert-May about progress

3. Communicate results of Archbold’s FIRST II with other science educators

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8. Participate as professional developers  of science faculty in Florida.

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Supported by the National Science Foundation grant number DUE 0088847.  Opinions expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily of the Foundation.