THREE PERSPECTIVES: THE SCIENTIST, THE STUDENT, AND THE TEACHER
Scientist's Perspective
We scientists participate in student and scientist partnerships to help
us with our research. But if you look at it from the point of view of a
research scientist who needs to get grant funding for his or her next project,
getting kids in five years time is not going to help, really. So to be honest,
I think, what must be in it for the scientist, and to convince colleagues
that they should participate in this kind of activity, is the promise that
they will be able to do real research in just this kind of activity. I can
formulate my thesis as a scientist and then discuss with an educator how
we can convey this idea to other people. This way, I can concentrate on
the science.
What I think a scientist can get out of SSPs is that we can ask and get
answers to research questions that cannot be answered in any other way.
To give a very simple example, one of the main problems in population biology
is understanding dispersement, such as the movement of an animal from the
place where it is born to the place where it will reproduce. As an ornithologist,
I study dispersement in birds. If you're a research scientist and you have
a study plot, 85 percent of the birds that breed there are of unknown origin
because they migrate from elsewhere, and the birds you mark as nesting disappear.
There's no way dispersal can be studied in any effective way at this time.
Dispersal is an indicator for many things, especially weather and environmental
resources. We need to understand where things come from, how far they go,
how they mix, and how it affects their characteristics. So what we are planning
is to have at least 50,000 people participating in this research within
four years time.
Together we will study a problem that has not been solved by any scientist
anywhere in the world, and we will do this as a group using anybody who
wants to participate—school kids who build nest boxes, teachers who
are interested in going outside, bluebird societies who want to save their
bluebirds—anybody who will want to participate in this partnership.
And this is much more extensive than any that have been described in the
last two days. It will involve all levels of communities, and it is going
to address an absolutely fundamental question for which there is no other
approach. If scientists can ask colleagues to examine the questions that
they have dreamed of but have not been able to study, they can formulate
those questions. Then in partnerships with schools, with volunteers, with
informal and formal systems, we can study them. If we can bring that across
to the scientists, then I think we will get many who will want to participate.
Student's Perspective
The big problem that I see with students and science is that we are
not taught to think. Through our entire science education we are sitting
in a classroom being lectured at. We learn concepts out of a book. When
it comes to laboratory work, we get a lot of hands-on experience, except
we are told in labs: "This is what we are learning in class. Why don't
we measure plant transpiration, for example, in this lab. This is what you
are going to do. If you get this result, you did the experiment right; if
you do not, you did it wrong." We are never given anything like: "We
are going to study plant transpiration. How should we do it?" thereby
letting us come up with the experiment ideas.
Through all 12 years of school we are spoon fed every single thing. We
never get the chance to figure out what we should be doing by ourselves.
So when we get thrown into the real world, for example, of scientific education
or science in college, we have never had any experience formulating our
own questions. Therefore we do not really have a good concept of science
as a process because we have never had to fight through the process. We
sort of know what it is, but we do not feel it.
I think that this is the major problem, and I think that student and
scientist partnerships can help us learn how to ask questions, a process
that we do not get right now. All we learn how to do now is look at a couple
of facts and come up with a conclusion. Usually we write an essay about
that conclusion. For example, we can know the Enlightenment was the direct
result of the Reformation, but that doesn't teach us how to think about
it.
Teacher's Perspective
I am happy when I have a student who goes on to be a real scientist.
I had a student a few years ago, who took the SAT, scored 1590, was not
happy with that, retook it, and got a 1600. The student received a Ph.D.
from Stanford in chaos theory in economics, so I am happy with that. I am
happier when my students demonstrate to me that they understand scientific
concepts. But I will tell you, what really makes me feel good is what I
think of as survival skills, survival skills for the 21st century. Here
are my survival skills.
One, I think we need to develop a generation of knowledge seekers. Two,
I think we need to develop a generation of learners who can apply knowledge.
We have not done that one very well at all. Three, I think we need to encourage
students to collaborate—collaborate with each other, collaborate with
scientists, collaborate with their teacher—to create a group, a community
of learners, if you will.
Fourth, we need to teach communication skills. How many schools in the
country actually teach these by having speech classes, for example. Five,
we need to focus on problem solving skills and find a way to measure those
skills. And last, we need to use technology actively. Do we want the technology
to control us, or do we want to control the technology? That is why I do
project-based science.
