It all started in 2021—the (STEM)2 Network, funded by a $500,000 award from the National Science Foundation, set out to support faculty in transforming undergraduate STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) education from within.
This network, which brings together math, biology and chemistry faculty from institutions across Long Island and New York City, became laser-focused on promoting and strengthening collaborations among faculty across disciplines to create an equitable and inclusive system for all students—with the intended effect of transforming the future of STEM.
Speaking the Same Language in STEM
The latest research publication to emerge from this partnership is “We Have More in Common than We Think: A Comparison of Scientific Skills and Disciplinary Practices in the Guiding Documents for Biology, Chemistry, and Mathematics,” co-authored by two Adelphi University professors who are part of the (STEM)2 Network—Daniel Silverio, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Chemistry, and Eugenia Villa-Cuesta, PhD, professor in the Department of Biology and associate dean for faculty affairs and academic advancement. This article digs into commonalities across scientific skills, practices and disciplines to promote teaching and learning, giving both educators and students a broader perspective on STEM.
Knowledge and collaboration across STEM practices is critically important—addressing complex scientific challenges, such as developing effective treatments for disease, as we saw during the COVID-19 pandemic, and developing clean energy to combat climate change, requires the synergistic work of individuals with diverse backgrounds, expertise and perspectives. Most of these issues also require transferable skills and a multidisciplinary approach. Importantly, Dr. Silverio says that simply knowing information from different disciplines is necessary to strike up collaborations.
In short, STEM professionals must be able to “speak the same language” in science. “Learning to engage in the process of inquiry, as well as to communicate and collaborate effectively about your work, is just as critical—if not more so—in today’s world as having deep expertise in a specific discipline,” said Dr. Silverio.
But cross-departmental collaboration, and even interdepartmental collaboration, among STEM disciplines can be challenging. Professors in higher education often teach in silos, in compartmentalized atmospheres. They sometimes expect students to independently apply knowledge from course to course, discipline to discipline. Consequently, students can struggle to connect concepts from different scientific areas, which only perpetuates the siloed mentality.
Building a new framework for collaboration in STEM curricula
Any successful change movement relies upon a well-developed road map to achieve its goals. For the (STEM)2 Network, developing its road map meant examining and comparing the “guiding documents” for the disciplines of biology, chemistry and mathematics. “Guiding documents,” Dr. Villa-Cuesta explained, “are frameworks developed by discipline-specific organizations to assist in developing curricula for undergraduate courses by giving detailed information on what a STEM major should be able to do upon receiving their degree.”
Over several months, Drs. Silverio and Villa-Cuesta, along with other (STEM)2 Network faculty members, worked together to create a table that would visually compare the guiding documents. Though the guiding documents for all three disciplines were written for different audiences and different purposes, over time a pattern of shared commonalities in scientific skills and disciplinary practices emerged. These commonalities were then grouped into six general skill categories: Scientific Inquiry, Quantitative Skills, Laboratory and Computational Skills, Oral and Written Communication, Interdisciplinary Nature of Science, and Teamwork and Interpersonal Skills. This alignment of the guiding documents, Drs. Silverio and Villa-Cuesta and their co-authors hoped, would allow faculty to bring the interdisciplinary nature of science into their classrooms, fostering familiarity with what is valued and emphasized in other disciplines. In other words, it will help everyone speak the same scientific language.
“If knowledge is like water, professors traditionally are giving students buckets of it, but we need to help them build the piping that allows the transfer of that knowledge when and where it is needed,” said Dr. Villa-Cuesta. “Comparing the guiding documents of our scientific disciplines is a first step toward facilitating this process.”
Along with their co-authors, Drs. Silverio and Villa-Cuesta wrote a manuscript that elaborates on those six general skill categories and provides additional detail, including specific suggestions on how educators seeking more interdisciplinary teaching can implement these scientific skills in the classroom. The group’s article, “We Have More in Common than We Think,” was the culmination of this project. Its publication conveyed an important message: While STEM professionals might sometimes work in isolation and even compete with each other, more can be achieved by harnessing the shared values and skills in STEM and working in collaboration.