Have you developed new evidence-based teaching activities and/or lessons designed to be taught in biology or physics undergraduate education? Are you interested in working with a group of peers to write and prepare your Lesson manuscript for submission to the journal CourseSource? CourseSource is partnering with BioQUEST and QUBES to offer semester-long Faculty Mentoring Networks (FMN)! Apply now to join us for the Spring 2023 CourseSource Writing FMN.

CourseSource is a peer-reviewed and open-access journal that publishes tested, evidence-based undergraduate activities. The articles include details in a format, style, and voice that supports replicability. Publishing activities in CourseSource provides authors with recognition of the creativity, experience, and time needed to develop effective classroom materials, while also supporting the dissemination of evidence-based teaching practices. Authors can list CourseSource articles in the peer-reviewed publication section of their curriculum vitae and use them as evidence for excellence in teaching.

CourseSource will now include both Biology and Physics! You can apply for this workshop in either discipline. We will have opportunities for sharing within and across disciplines.  

FMN members will participate in seven, biweekly virtual sessions to collaborate with and support others in the network and receive mentoring. Accepted applicants will write a Lesson article manuscript, section by section, to prepare for submission to CourseSource. Topics may vary (see current "Courses" available in CourseSource), but all participants planning on writing an article in biology must include an online component (e.g., fully synchronous or asynchronous online courses, hybrid courses, or adaptations for an online environment).

Meetings will be held on Wednesdays from 4:30 – 6:00 pm Eastern Time. The virtual kick-off will be held on February 8, 2023. Applications are due January 30, 2023. Accepted applicants will be notified by February 1, 2023. Space is limited to 16 participants.

More information about the FMN such as eligibility and dates can be found at the Qualtrics sign-up page: https://cuboulder.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_3y2KzTfipFpPbwO

We hope to see you virtually this Spring!

Jenny Knight, CourseSource Editor-in-Chief for Biology / knight@colorado.edu

Melissa Dancy, CourseSource Editor-in-Chief for Physics / melissa.dancy@gmail.com

Sharleen Flowers, CourseSource Managing Editor / coursesourceeditor@gmail.com

CourseSource has recently partnered with the Society of Toxicology (SOT), and we are recruiting submissions that utilize the Toxicology Learning Framework to add to the toxicology collection!

Interested in sharing your work? Check out this video recording of the CourseSource workshop held at the 2022 SOT Annual Meeting: Publishing Educational Toxicology Exercises in CourseSource: A Step-by-Step Workshop for Preparing Your Manuscript. This workshop equips educators to use CourseSource and inspires them to submit their inclusive, evidence-based educational resources. In the first part of the workshop, Erin Vinson, the former managing editor of CourseSource, reviews the design of the CourseSource website and its features, and the various types for submissions. In the second part, Lauren Aleksunes (“Repurposing Drugs as Countermeasures for Chemical Weapons: An Interactive Training for Undergraduate Students”), Joshua Gray (“Pick Your Poison: A Semester-Long Toxicology Project Integrating Toxicology Core Concepts and Scientific Communication”), and Mindy Reynolds (“A Case Study Approach to the One Environmental Health Hypothesis”) discuss their curricula and the preparation of CourseSource manuscripts. The last section provides time for participants to prepare their own concepts for submission.

We look forward to seeing your submissions!