Transforming Curricula by Engaging Students and Faculty

The shared vision for educating all undergraduates in 21^st-century life sciences relies on the development of scientific literacy to prepare for biology-related challenges in multiple career paths and in society. In this rapidly expanding field, core concepts like evolution and structure/function are best learned in the context of the way biology is conducted: evidence-based, quantitative, collaborative, interdisciplinary, and integrative between multiple scientific systems and with the broader community. This new educational framework was used from 2006-07 to 2010-11 to renew and expand course and program menus for the ~3,000 students in the Human Biology Program, a collaboration between the Faculties of Arts & Science and Medicine at the research-intensive University of Toronto. Student-centered learning was promoted in 21 existing courses, and integral to 35 new courses and 5 new non-GPA-restricted Major programs aligned with existing restricted Specialist programs. To engage students in critically exploring the evidence-based nature of the scientific process, topical course themes were chosen for relevance to students, teachers and programs (e.g. Complementary & Alternative Medicine for health-related programs). Many courses synthesized information at multiple levels (e.g. lab course integrated stress experiments with microarrays, cell culture and exercising students): others with society (e.g. shadowing healthcare professionals; 1/2-day to 10-week service learning). Active classroom learning capitalized on student interaction in team-based (e.g. genetics), case-based (e.g. biotechnology) and inquiry-based (e.g. lab) settings. First-hand insight into the scientific process involved interaction with local and international basic science and clinical researchers as lecturers, interviewees, lab visit hosts, literature research mentors, and individual laboratory and public health research project supervisors. Frequent assessment requiring appropriate course- and program-level content and competencies became the norm (e.g. quizzes, abstracts, grant proposals, wikis, blogs, videos, posters, debates, talks, peer review). Our students and faculty embraced this curricular process and outcome. More students enrolled in our courses (increased by ~2,600); chose the smaller communities of focused Majors over the general Life Science Major (2:1); voted with their feet by remaining in and graduating from our Major programs (increased by > 20%); and expressed satisfaction with their Human Biology program (5.3 on a 7-point scale). Hundreds of faculty members, particularly those interested in acquiring research trainees, welcomed a variety of new undergraduate teaching commitments. Although not every program needs this scale of transformation, the remarkable success of applying current initiatives in biology education to this large multi-disciplinary life sciences program should encourage application in smaller contexts and generalization to other disciplines.