OPS 2-15
NEON's higher education program: Providing undergraduate experiences in observatory building and continental scale ecology
“Big” spatio-temporal datasets are becoming more common. Specifically, the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) will collect 30 years of standardized, open and free ecological data across the United States, providing an unprecedented opportunity to understand large scale processes. Integrating data collection, processing and analysis techniques into undergraduate coursework, and providing real-world research experiences early in students' careers are critical in preparing next generation scientists focused on understanding large scale processes – contributing to our knowledge of continental and global scale issues.
However, providing such experiences for students early in their career presents several challenges. Integration of big data into existing courses requires familiarization with new data types and processing / collection methods. Data analysis itself is daunting, given large file sizes and uncertainty regarding best analysis methods. Finally, teaching resources that demonstrate key data concepts take time to find or develop.
NEON’s higher education program provides students with real-world experiences (i.e., internships, REUs) in building an ecological observatory and using big data to better understand ecological change over large regions. The program also will provide faculty with state-of-the-art resources and tools to facilitate integration of large datasets into university classrooms.
Results/Conclusions
Internship program, year 2 results
Building on success from year 1, we expanded the internship program to support six undergraduates, from a variety of disciplines including engineering, computer science, ecology, and imaging science. Interns were teamed with multiple mentors and tackled real-world problems important to NEON’s mission. Given the interdisciplinary nature of observatory science, this year’s interns focused on understanding how their project integrated with other disciplines and contributed to the overall NEON design. Recruiting students from groups underrepresented in STEM improved but still poses a significant challenge. New recruiting approaches (e.g., partnerships with key institutions, faculty nominations, intern teams) are being considered for next year.
Online education portal, early results
NEON is initiating and facilitating a collaborative University-focused online education portal with content to include 1) interactive, online multi-media that explain key big data concepts; and 2) packaged “lab” activities featuring NEON data and code. To facilitate broad use, all materials will incorporate free open source, analysis tools.
Feedback from scientist review of initial educational products (i.e., videos, infographics) has been positive and constructive, and some scientists are already incorporating these resources into their teaching. All products will be freely available on the educator portal, currently under construction.