Building Community Among Novice and Advanced Students Through Data Sharing

Doonan, L., McGuier, N., Drill, E., and Doonan, C.

The Frontiers, Analysis, and Discovery laboratory course is an inquiry-based lab course for first-year students interested in biology. A major learning objective is to facilitate connections between the first-year and upper- class biology students. This fosters a sense of community within the department and creates a sense of belongingness for first-years. To make these connections, we designed guided sharing activities that require both student groups to meet and work together sharing data from their respective classes, comparing techniques, and completing a data analysis task.  We observed that the students enjoyed meeting one another in addition to reinforcing core concepts and facilitating student connections. These activities can be adapted for any two courses in which an upper-level course builds off of a 100-level course. Participants will experience the class activity by working with a partner to interpret a dataset from the S19 semester. Additional activities will be available for review and discussion.

Lynley Doonan, Biological Sciences
Natalie McGuier, Biological Sciences
Emily Drill, Biological Sciences
Carrie Doonan, Biological Sciences