Karin Ellison

Nanotechnology and Society: A discussion-based undergraduate course

Nanotechnology has emerged as a broad, exciting, yet ill-defined field of scientific research and technological innovation. There are important questions about the technology’s potential economic, social, and environmental implications. We discuss an undergraduate course on nanoscience and nanotechnology for students from a wide range of disciplines, including the natural and social sciences, the humanities, and engineering. The course explores these questions and the broader place of technology in contemporary societies. The course is built around active learning methods and seeks to develop the students’ critical thinking skills, written and verbal communication abilities, and general knowledge of nanoscience and nanoengineering concepts. Continuous assessment was used to gain information about the effectiveness of class discussions and enhancement of student understanding of the interaction between nanotechnology and society.

Work in progress - using case studies to increase the retention of female doctoral students in STEM Fields

This paper discusses part of the NSF funded project, CareerWISE: Internet-delivered resilience training to increase the persistence of Women Ph.D. Students in STEM Fields. Research shows that rates of doctoral student attrition (i.e., beginning and then not completing a doctoral degree program) are substantially higher for women than for men, including in the physical sciences and engineering. The CareerWISE project addresses this problem through the development of a Web-based resource consisting of training materials that will build the resilience skills, problem solving skills, and persistence of women in science and engineering PhD programs. CareerWISE is currently in the second of three years, and this paper focuses primarily on the portion of the project involving written case studies. The differences between the types of case studies traditionally used in science and engineering courses and the CareerWISE case studies are discussed, along with the plans for evaluating and integrating the cases with the other pieces of the CareerWISE project.

Designing an EAC Program for the School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University: Early Initiatives and Lessons from the Literature

In Fall 2015 the School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University began a systematic expansion of an ethics across the curriculum program as part of its Life Science Ethics Program. This essay presents the initial elements of that program, reviews the literatures on ethics across the curriculum programs and responsible conduct of research education programs, and concludes with lessons from the literature for ethics education program development. While ethics across the curriculum programs, such as ASU’s Life Science Ethics Program, are likely to be eclectic in specific activities and teaching approaches, they can benefit from (a) having a coordinating body, (b) attending to development of ethics and ethics education competencies across faculty in the community, and (c) using assessment to illuminate opportunities for improvement.