Golden, CO., May 16, 2022 – In collaboration with Tiny Earth, Codon Learning will develop a digital, open-access Scientific Teaching course in its platform. The course will integrate an AJEDI (antiracist, just, equitable, diverse, and inclusive) approach to teaching. The collaboration is generously funded by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.
More than half of all students who begin their college career as a STEM major do not finish with a STEM degree. This lack of retention disproportionately affects students from historically underserved groups—first-generation college attendees, students from racial and ethnic minorities, and students from low-income families. The goal of the Scientific Teaching Course is to help faculty apply evidence-based teaching practices that are proven to boost student learning, increase retention, and bridge pervasive representation gaps. Much of the content and overall design for the course will be drawn from Scientific Teaching, the pioneering book written by Jo Handelsman, Sarah Miller, and Christine Pfund.
“We’re thrilled to have received this support from the Hewlett Foundation. For the last 20 years, I have been a part of an incredible network of educators who have created a curriculum to help instructors teach with inclusive evidence-based practices. This grant will allow us to digitize and scale a highly engaging and interactive version of the curriculum within Codon Learning’s platform. We will be able to reach science educators all over the world at every level of the curriculum,” said Dr. Jennifer Knight, chief academic officer of Codon Learning.
The team is led by Jennifer Knight, Associate Professor of Biology in the Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology at the University of Colorado Boulder and Codon Learning’s Chief Academic Officer and Sarah Miller, Executive Director of Tiny Earth at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Jo Handelsman, Director of the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery and Professor of Plant Pathology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison will serve in an advisory capacity.
ABOUT tiny earth and the hewlett foundation
Tiny Earth inspires and retains students in the sciences while addressing one of the most pressing global health challenges of our century—the diminishing supply of effective antibiotics. Tiny Earthlings are college students who enroll in a Tiny Earth research course to discover antibiotics from soil bacteria in their own backyards. This innovative, international network was created by Dr. Jo Handelsman, Vilas Research Professor and Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor of Plant Pathology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and former Associate Director for Science at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation is a nonpartisan, private charitable foundation that advances ideas and supports institutions to promote a better world. For more than 50 years, the foundation has supported efforts to advance education for all, preserve the environment, support vibrant performing arts, make the philanthropy sector more effective, and foster gender equity and responsive governance around the world.