Publications by authors named "Sharday Ewell"

Cisheteronormative ideologies are infused into every aspect of society, including undergraduate science. We set out to identify the extent to which students can identify cisheteronormative language in biology textbooks by posing several hypothetical textbook questions and asking students to modify them to make the language more accurate (defined as "correct; precise; using language that applies to all people"). First, we confirmed that textbooks commonly use language that conflates or confuses sex and gender.

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Student-study behaviors and metacognition are predictors of student-academic success. However, student metacognitive evaluation of their own study habit behavior use has been largely unexplored. To address this gap, we gave students enrolled in three different Biology courses ( = 1140) a survey that asked them to identify the study behaviors used to prepare for their first and third exams and to appraise the effectiveness of each behavior.

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Traditional biology curricula depict science as an objective field, overlooking the important influence that human values and biases have on what is studied and who can be a scientist. We can work to address this shortcoming by incorporating into the curriculum, which is an understanding of biases, stereotypes, and assumptions that shape contemporary and historical science. We surveyed a national sample of lower-level biology instructors to determine 1) why it is important for students to learn science, 2) the perceived educational value of ideological awareness in the classroom, and 3) hesitancies associated with ideological awareness implementation.

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Interest in biology education research (BER) has been growing over the last two decades, yet few BER publications focus on community colleges, which serve a large percentage of the undergraduate student population and a majority of those students who identify with historically underserved groups. In this paper, we define community college biology education research (CC BER) as publications with a community college faculty member as an author, publications with a community college study context or a focus on community college biology teaching and learning, and publications that use community college students as a source of data. We conducted a literature review to quantify how CC BER has progressed since initial calls for broadening participation by recording the number of CC BER publications in seven prominent journals between 2016 and 2020.

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To achieve meaningful learning experiences in online classrooms, students must become self-regulated learners through the development of effective study habits. Currently, there is no set of recommendations to promote study habits in online biology learning environments. To fill gaps in our understanding, a working group associated with a research coordination network (Equity and Diversity in Undergraduate STEM, EDU-STEM) convened virtually in June 2021.

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Test anxiety is a common experience shared by college students and is typically investigated in the context of traditional, face-to-face courses. However, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in the closure of universities, and many students had to rapidly shift to and balance the challenges of online learning. We investigated how the shift to online learning during the pandemic impacted trait (habitual) and state (momentary) test anxiety and whether there was variation across different demographic groups already vulnerable to performance gaps in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses.

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While science has profound social impacts, we often teach biology as removed from societally debated issues. Here, we address this gap in biology education through the implementation of novel materials that promote ideological awareness (IA). Using mixed-method analyses, we explore students' perceptions of the relationship between science and society, as well as their attitudes toward and knowledge of IA in biology.

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Studies utilizing genetic and pharmacological manipulations in rodent models and neuronal cultures have revealed myriad roles of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). Currently, this knowledge of BDNF function is being translated into improvement strategies for several debilitating neurological disorders in which BDNF abnormalities play a prominent role. Common among the BDNF-related disorders are irregular trafficking and release of mature BDNF (mBDNF) and/or its prodomain predecessor, proBDNF.

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