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Historically, the knowledge, critical skills, and dispositions to be learned in educational foundations courses are explored within the confines of university classrooms, disconnected from the messy and complex realities in local public schools. Because the vast majority of university students in education courses are white and middle to upper-middle class, it is often difficult for them to see beyond their own experiences in school and understand the experiences of students who are members of marginalized or disenfranchized groups. This was the impetus for developing a model of place-based learning for university students--a model to help them develop stronger and more meaningful connections between theory and practice, a stronger sense of familiarity with students and teachers in the local community, and to give them hands-on experience building the trusting relationships with young people that are essential for deep learning. The partnership study described in this paper was intended to help students more deeply understand and apply concepts and theories being taught in a social foundations of education course, thereby shedding light on systemic inequalities that often exist within public schools.

Engaging undergraduate students in scientific research promises substantial benefits, but it is not accessible to all students and is rarely implemented early in college education, when it will have the greatest impact. An inclusive Research Education Community (iREC) provides a centralized scientific and administrative infrastructure enabling engagement of large numbers of students at different types of institutions. The Science Education Alliance-Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science (SEA-PHAGES) is an iREC that promotes engagement and continued involvement in science among beginning undergraduate students. The SEA-PHAGES students show strong gains correlated with persistence relative to those in traditional laboratory courses regardless of academic, ethnic, gender, and socioeconomic profiles. This persistent involvement in science is reflected in key measures, including project ownership, scientific community values, science identity, and scientific networking.

This article shares and examines the challenges, findings, and lessons learned associated with embracing peaceful leadership styles during the first two years of a partnership between a failing K-12 urban school district and a university in the United States. The ongoing daily leadership issues that influenced, but were beyond the scope of, the partnership are also explored. Through the individual and collective lens of six educational leaders (K-12 and higher education) who embraced leadership feminist practices embedded in structures of difference, Buddhist philosophies, equity, and social justice, this study examines and illustrates the administrative efforts associated with "going against one's grain" when faced with the proverbial brick wall.

UnlabelledEngaging large numbers of undergraduates in authentic scientific discovery is desirable but difficult to achieve. We have developed a general model in which faculty and teaching assistants from diverse academic institutions are trained to teach a research course for first-year undergraduate students focused on bacteriophage discovery and genomics. The course is situated within a broader scientific context aimed at understanding viral diversity, such that faculty and students are collaborators with established researchers in the field. The Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Science Education Alliance Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science (SEA-PHAGES) course has been widely implemented and has been taken by over 4,800 students at 73 institutions. We show here that this alliance-sourced model not only substantially advances the field of phage genomics but also stimulates students' interest in science, positively influences academic achievement, and enhances persistence in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines. Broad application of this model by integrating other research areas with large numbers of early-career undergraduate students has the potential to be transformative in science education and research training.ImportanceEngagement of undergraduate students in scientific research at early stages in their careers presents an opportunity to excite students about science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines and promote continued interests in these areas. Many excellent course-based undergraduate research experiences have been developed, but scaling these to a broader impact with larger numbers of students is challenging. The Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Science Education Alliance Phage Hunting Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science (SEA-PHAGES) program takes advantage of the huge size and diversity of the bacteriophage population to engage students in discovery of new viruses, genome annotation, and comparative genomics, with strong impacts on bacteriophage research, increased persistence in STEM fields, and student self-identification with learning gains, motivation, attitude, and career aspirations.