This article details the learning experiences emerging from a research collaboration between a university-based research team and an informal education provider (the STEM Academy). The aim was to enhance the community responsiveness of a series of science clubs for children living in low-income communities in a metropolitan area of Canada. The…

Individual development plans (IDPs) are increasingly being used in higher education to provide personalized guidance to students that can foster a more purposeful and productive education experience. In this study, we document the graduate student's perspective on the effectiveness of the IDP based on responses from students in course- and…

The Arts and Science Honours Academy (ASHA) is a unique interdisciplinary undergraduate honours programme at a large research-intensive university in Canada. Data were collected in early 2020 from 108 past and present students, representing the first eleven cohorts of the programme. Triangulating results from quantitative and qualitative analyses,…

Science education scholars agree that it is important for teachers to be prepared to teach science as more than facts and information. Part of this preparation is understanding the nature, history, and philosophy of science and its impact on scientific knowledge. However, research has shown that science teachers are often unfamiliar with the ideas…

Students as partners (SaP) has emerged as a way to innovate curriculum development and create more inclusive learning experiences for students in postsecondary settings. Popular models of SaP are time intensive, involving student and instructor dyads that meet frequently. Less is known about short-term consultant models of SaP and the impact on…

For over two decades now, the application of Citizen Science to Education has been evolving, and fundamental topics, such as the drivers of motivation to participate in Citizen Science projects, are still under discussion. Some recent developments, though, like the use of Artificial Intelligence to support data collection and validation, seem to…

Children in low-income neighbourhoods experience an intersection of socio-structural factors that delimit their engagement with out-of-school (informal) science education. Using Bourdieu's framework of habitus, this paper explores how informal science educators and children in a given low-income community in western Canada described the attitudes,…

Since the 1990s, scientists and Indigenous peoples have worked together across Inuit Nunangat (Inuit homeland in Canada) to conduct research on contaminants in ringed seals ("Pusa hispida"; "natsiq," "natchiq" or [foreign characters ommitted] in Inuktut), a species of high cultural, economic and nutritional importance…

The 24 Nature Notes project was part of the China-Canada Reciprocal Learning Program. Two sister schools participated in the project. Following the same set of dates, students from both schools conducted outdoor observations and collected data. Skype meetings were arranged to exchange ideas and share student work. This study aims to understand the…

A primary aim of science education is to teach students how to interpret and engage with scientific information. To do so effectively requires an adequate understanding of the nature of science (NOS)--in other words, what science is and how it works. There is a long history of evidence to suggest that many undergraduate students struggle to…

Purpose: The Canadian university where this study took place has established an international exchange program in teacher education with a large Chinese university. This study was designed to examine how the international exchange program influenced Chinese science teacher candidates' understanding of science education and how such learning…

Large enrollments in undergraduate courses pose several teaching and learning challenges that impact students' learning experience and performance. Implementing co-learning activities in tutorials of large courses can help mitigate these challenges and improve the learning environment. One type of collaborative learning activity that has become…

In this paper, I engage with arguments put forth by Anna Günther-Hanssen in her article "A swing and a child: How scientific phenomena can come to matter for preschool children's emergent science identities." Günther-Hanssen argues that new materialism can help us see how scientific phenomena can create affordances in becoming scientific…

Due to increasing urbanization, wetlands and streams within city limits are being altered, filled in, and degraded. The habitat that remains is critical for providing urban areas with ecosystem services and maintaining biodiversity, yet is often insufficiently monitored by environmental agencies due to a lack of resources. To help fill this void,…

There are a growing number of education programs in science and STEM education with the aim of improving educational outcomes for Indigenous students who have long been underrepresented in current education systems. The aim of this study is to systematically review empirical research from 2011 to 2020 that reported programs to support Indigenous…