INS 8: Infectious Lessons: Teaching Disease Ecology

Session Organizer(s)

• Sarah Budischak

  Keck Science, Claremont McKenna, Pitzer, and Scripps Colleges
  Claremont, CA, USA

Volunteer(s)

• Andrea Valcarcel Abud

Moderator(s)

• Nina Wale

  Michigan State University

• Ana Bento

  Indiana University

Disease ecology is an emerging, highly interdisciplinary, and fast-growing subfield of ecology. More departments are offering formal coursework in disease ecology or adding disease ecology sections into existing ecology courses. However, there is currently no undergraduate-level textbook available, and existing repositories of course syllabi have few computational labs and even fewer ‘wet’ lab activities. We have invited speakers for this session who will begin to fill in these gaps. They will not only help to share teaching ideas through their inspire talks and the subsequent discussion, but also by sharing their materials (on Disease Ecology Section’s repository) for even wider distribution.
 
The topics that our speakers will address range from specific ready-to-implement examples to broader perspectives on what and how we should be teaching our students. For example, Cat Searle will talk about how and why to run a CURE in disease ecology. We will have two complementary speakers discussing how and why to teach quantitative skills; Marm Kilpatrick on why to focus on this topic and Arietta Fleming-Davies on a project-based learning approach to doing so. Our six additional speakers will provide specific examples of successful lessons on a diverse array of topics. Together our proposed speakers are providing practical and general teaching advice to others in the field, both of which will greatly benefit students and faculty interested in Disease Ecology and Evolution

Presentations:

• ON DEMAND

  A CURE all?: Creating course-based research opportunities for undergraduates in disease ecology
  

  Presenting Author: Catherine L. Searle – Department of Biological Sciences, Purdue University
• ON DEMAND

  Choose your own epidemic adventure: A jigsaw-style team effort to control a simulated snake fungal disease outbreak
  

  Presenting Author: Skylar R. Hopkins – Applied Ecology, North Carolina State University
• ON DEMAND

  Incorporating disease ecology in curriculum of landscape architecture and environmental horticulture: Important roles for informal teaching and mentorship in higher education
  

  Presenting Author: Brooke Sullivan – University of Washington
• ON DEMAND

  Literature review group writing projects in Disease Ecology
  

  Presenting Author: Rachel M. Penczykowski – Department of Biology, Washington University in St. Louis
• ON DEMAND

  Open-ended & student-driven engagement with hypotheses in evolutionary medicine
  

  Presenting Author: Cynthia J. Downs – Dept. of Environmental Biology, SUNY College of Environment and Forestry
• ON DEMAND

  Using drawing to teach and learn ecology
  

  Presenting Author: Evelyn Rynkiewicz – Science and Math, Fashion Institute of Technology
• ON DEMAND

  Using project-based learning in disease ecology to develop mathematical modeling and computational skills
  

  Presenting Author: Arietta Fleming-Davies – Biology, University of San Diego
• ON DEMAND

  You be the node: Simulating transmission in student generated networks
  

  Presenting Author: David J. Civitello – Department of Biology, Emory University