Undergraduate research experiences in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields are championed for promoting students’ personal and professional development. Mentorship is an integral part of undergraduate research, as effective mentorship maximizes the benefits undergraduates realize from participating in research. Yet almost no research examines instances in which mentoring is less effective or even problematic, even though prior research on mentoring in workplace settings suggests negative mentoring experiences are common. Here, we report the results of a qualitative study to define and characterize negative mentoring experiences of undergraduate life science researchers. Undergraduate researchers in our study reported seven major ways they experienced negative mentoring: absenteeism, abuse of power, interpersonal mismatch, lack of career support, lack of psychosocial support, misaligned expectations, and unequal treatment. They described some of these experiences as the result of absence of positive mentoring behavior and others as actively harmful behavior, both of which they perceive as detrimental to their psychosocial and career development. Our results are useful to mentors for reflecting on ways their behaviors might be perceived as harmful or unhelpful. These findings can also serve as a foundation for future research aimed at examining the prevalence and impact of negative mentoring experiences in undergraduate research.

Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) serve to increase student access to authentic scientific opportunities. Current evidence within the literature indicates that engagement in CUREs promotes students’ science identity development, science self-efficacy, motivation, and ability to “think like a scientist.” Despite the importance of these findings, few studies have examined the behaviors and interactions occurring within CURE and non-CURE settings and the impact of those behaviors on said student outcomes. To address these concerns, we conducted a mixed-methods study to explore student and instructor behaviors in four CURE and four non-CURE introductory biology laboratory sections. Representative video data were collected in each section and coded using the Laboratory Observation Protocol for Undergraduate STEM. In addition, pre/postsemester affective survey data were obtained from CURE and non-CURE participants. Results indicated that CURE students and instructors engaged in more interactive behaviors (e.g., one-on-one dialogue, questioning) than their non-CURE counterparts, a finding confirmed by analyzing behavioral patterns via construction of partial correlation networks. Multiple regression analyses further revealed that both student and instructor interactive behaviors and enrollment in a CURE were strong predictors of pre/postsemester shifts in student motivation, science identity development, collaboration, and perceived opportunities to make relevant scientific discoveries.

Advancement of the scientific enterprise relies on individuals conducting research in an ethical and responsible manner. Educating emergent scholars in the principles of ethics/responsible conduct of research (E/RCR) is therefore critical to ensuring such advancement. The recent impetus to include authentic research opportunities as part of the undergraduate curriculum, via course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs), has been shown to increase cognitive and noncognitive student outcomes. Because of these important benefits, CUREs are becoming more common and often constitute the first research experience for many students. However, despite the importance of E/RCR in the research process, we know of few efforts to incorporate E/RCR education into CUREs. The Ethics Network for Course-based Opportunities in Undergraduate Research (ENCOUR) was created to address this concern and promote the integration of E/RCR within CUREs in the biological sciences and related disciplines. During the inaugural ENCOUR meeting, a four-pronged approach was used to develop guidelines for the effective integration of E/RCR in CUREs. This approach included: 1) defining appropriate student learning objectives; 2) identifying relevant curriculum; 3) identifying relevant assessments; and 4) defining key aspects of professional development for CURE facilitators. Meeting outcomes, including the aforementioned E/RCR guidelines, are described herein.

Field courses provide transformative learning experiences that support success and improve persistence for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics majors. But field courses have not increased proportionally with the number of students in the natural sciences. We conducted a scoping review to investigate the factors influencing undergraduate participation in and the outcomes from field courses in the United States. Our search yielded 61 articles, from which we classified the knowledge, affect, behavior, and skill-based outcomes resulting from field course participation. We found consistent reporting on course design but little reporting on demographics, which limits our understanding of who takes field courses. Cost was the most commonly reported barrier to student participation, and knowledge gains were the most commonly reported outcome. This scoping review underscores the need for more rigorous and evidence-based investigations of student outcomes in field courses. Understanding how field courses support or hinder student engagement is necessary to make them more accessible to all students.

An understanding of both cognitive and affective domains of learning is critical to promoting undergraduate student success in biology. Field courses—which support student learning, observation, and experimentation in the outdoors—have been shown to be effective in supporting cognitive student outcomes. However, less is known about students' affective responses during field instruction. To better understand the affective domain in this course type, we asked students enrolled in a campus‐based introductory field biology course to engage in weekly reflective journaling over the course of a semester. We employed inductive and deductive coding of over 700 field journal reflections using the Model of the Affective Domain for the Geosciences as a conceptual basis. Informed by our results, we present a theoretically‐driven, five‐part Framework of Student Affect in Field Biology and in‐depth and novel insights into what students feel, believe, and value as they participate in an undergraduate field course. Our framework and coding results can be used by field course instructors to understand how to better design experiences that leave students feeling confident in their abilities, interested to learn more about nature, and empowered to persist in the discipline.