Coordinated distributed experiments in higher education: There is a low barrier to entry and there's potential for student projects

Background/Question/Methods

We focused our research on the implementation of a coordinated distributed experiment (CDE) using complementary approaches investigating local adaptation in common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca), a host plant for the declining monarch butterfly population, using educational networks across the U.S. Undergraduate researchers are the “boots on the ground” in many published CDE studies, however, no mention is made of the nature of the educational implementation of CDEs for higher education faculty or opportunities afforded their undergraduate students, gaps we address through the following research questions. In what ways do higher education faculty use CDE for educational purposes and what are the opportunities and challenges faculty face?In what ways did the CDE offer opportunities and challenges for undergraduate students?Faculty participants (10) were recruited from the Ecological Research as Education Network (EREN) who helped us recruit their former Undergraduate students. The study design used both quantitative and qualitative data collection techniques. Quantitative data was drawn from the Milkweed Local Adaptation (MLA) CDE database, including participants and stems of milkweed counted across the three project years. Qualitative data included faculty survey responses (10), semi-structured interviews of faculty (9) and former undergraduates (5), and review of undergraduate research posters, papers and curricula (6).

Results/Conclusions

Quantitative analysis of the MLA CDE database illustrates a decline in both participating institutions and in counts of milkweed stems over the project (2018-2020), outcomes impacting the amount of data collected. Qualitative data analysis revealed three key findings. CDEs: 1) offer opportunities for higher education faculty and their students to be part of ongoing and authentic research including developing skills of data collection, analysis and interpretation; 2) have unexpected challenges including field site management; and 3) can inspire undergraduate students to develop independent research projects or curricular modules for use in formal 6-12 classrooms. Broader ecological educational implications of our outcomes in using CDEs for higher education faculty and their undergraduate students include: 1) recommendation that faculty members involved in CDEs ought to be proactively informed about potential challenges and provided with guidance on how to mitigate them; 2) mitigating challenges with more comprehensive model studies to try to estimate the sample size and redundancy likely to produce robust data; 3) proactive use of the educational network to understand institutional use of the CDE project with undergraduates and 4) CDEs offer nuanced opportunities for undergraduate to develop nature of science skills in the development of independent research projects and curricula.