As a discipline-based education researcher, I conduct research in undergraduate biology education, which as a field aims to understand the teaching and learning of biology. Recent research in education and cognitive psychology has led to a better understanding of how students learn, and this has instigated national calls to reform the way biology is taught at the undergraduate level. My research focuses on understanding how self-beliefs and values related to motivation influence achievement and persistence in undergraduate biology students.
I am particularly interested in biology majors' motivation to learn quantitative skills, such as statistics and mathematical modeling. Mathematics can induce disinterest and anxiety in students, which can lead to disengagement on quantitative tasks. Therefore, it is critical to understand pedagogical strategies that can increase students' motivation on quantitative tasks. Drawing from educational theory, I ultimately seek to understand how students' educational experiences in quantitative biology affect their self-efficacy and personal values towards quantitative biology tasks, their performance on quantitative biology tasks, and their choices to take additional quantitative biology courses. I am also interested in questions related to faculty motivation to teach quantitative skills in their biology courses.
Additionally, as part of my postdoctoral work, I have examined mentoring in undergraduate research experiences. Graduate students and postdocs often serve as mentors at research universities, increasing the number of undergraduates who can participate in research. My research, in collaboration with colleagues at UGA, seeks to understand how mentoring by a graduate student or postdoc and a faculty member contribute to undergraduate researcher outcomes.
