Description

The Biological and Environmental Data Education (BEDE) Network is a community of scientists and educators whose mission is to support instructors as they integrate more data science skills into undergraduate biology and environmental science curricula. One of the ways the network will achieve this objective is through the creation of a data science skills framework, a “Curriculum Map,” presented here as an open educational resource. Over the course of two years, members of the BEDE Network built the Curriculum Map as a flexible tool to help instructors highlight data science skills that are already being taught and to discover new areas to add data science skills that complement the content of their courses or program.

The intended audience for this resource is instructors who teach undergraduates in biological and environmental science courses and was specifically built to focus on the data science skills needed to be successful in those types of courses. This tool is not intended to provide a complete list of data science skills that one would find in a data analytics program, for example. The Curriculum Map was built by a committee of scientists and educators representing different schools, fields, positions, and career stages. There are representatives from four-year colleges and community colleges, research institutions and primarily undergraduate institutions. Committee members have backgrounds in multiple fields, including ecology, microbiology, geography, biology education, and data analytics.

The Curriculum Map is organized around seven major data science skill categories: Data Management, Analysis, Visualization, Coding, Modeling, Ethics, and Reproducibility. Each major category is broken up into subcategories and then skill areas that are associated with specific student learning outcomes. For each skill area, the foundational learning outcomes are indicated. Files included with this resource include the Curriculum Map itself as an Excel spreadsheet (with links to a Google Sheets version) and an Instructions document to use with the Curriculum Map. The Instructions contain a description of the Curriculum Map, suggestions for how to use it (page 7), and two helpful visuals: a listing of the categories, subcategories, and skill areas (Figure 1) and a concept map illustrating some of the connections between those subcategories and skill areas (Figure 3).

The BEDE Network is interested in collecting feedback on this resource and learning from the people who are using it. If you would like to be involved in future feedback and/or survey opportunities, please leave your info at this form.

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