Community College of Philadelphia

With funding from MetLife Foundation, the League for Innovation in the Community College engaged in a yearlong study in 2009 of the nature of innovation in the community college. Using recipients of the League's Innovation of the Year Award at 19 community colleges during the period from 1999 through 2008 as a data set, the authors used document analysis, focus groups, surveys, and interviews to study the kinds of innovations awarded, the characteristics of a community college culture that support and encourage innovation, and the perspectives of the award winners regarding the impact of innovation and the impact of the award itself on the winners. This article focuses on the findings regarding the professional and personal impact of the innovation and the award on the award-winners, as well as the impact of the innovation and the award on various populations and the institution itself. Findings support that (a) innovations are acknowledged by college leaders as valuable and have changed the behavior of individuals for whom they were created; (b) award recipients were highly satisfied with the recognition they received from the League and from their colleagues, and were motivated to champion the innovation and to create more innovations; and (c) innovations in this study are evidence of highly creative use of resources and effective and efficient implementation practices, including, where warranted, improved student learning.

Understanding and developing habits in complex systems thinking using STEM-integrated perspectives is essential in addressing education and workforce needs in society. In this study, we investigated a learning intervention that incorporated multiple models designed to improve engineering students’ understanding of complex systems through investigating the mechanobiology of the Venus flytrap. Mechanobiology is a transdisciplinary field that integrates biology, engineering, chemistry, and physics to explore how cells and tissues sense and respond to forces in their environment. We used an exploratory, mixed-methods approach to examine the impact of this new curriculum on investigating flytrap closure and prey digestion. We then evaluated students’ understanding of complex systems characteristics (i.e., many interacting parts, decentralization, non-linear interactions, emergence, and adaptation) and in their ability to transfer these principles to other systems. Qualitative analyses demonstrate that students articulated key systems principles in relation to their understanding of flytrap mechanobiology, while descriptive summaries of pre- and post-surveys suggest broader conceptual gains. Furthermore, students demonstrated the transfer of systems thinking to other contexts and reported an enhanced understanding of real-world STEM research.

It is known that, for ordinary Hölder multifunctions with 0 < α < 1, Hölder regularity alone does not guarantee the existence of a Hölder selection, and in general even a continuous selection may fail to exist. We ask how this situation changes when the parameter is measured through a Stieltjes clock. For 0 < α < 1, we characterize the clocks for which every compact-valued g-Hölder multifunction admits a g-Hölder selection. The determining condition is uniform disconnectedness of the clock image Im(g). For left-continuous and nondecreasing clocks, this condition is equivalent to uniform jump dominance: every positive clock increment contains a jump carrying a fixed positive fraction of that increment. Under this condition, a selection can be chosen through any prescribed point of the graph, with explicit control of its Hölder regularity. Conversely, when the condition fails, there exists a compact-valued g-Hölder multifunction with no g-Hölder selection. The results show that the selection property is governed not simply by the presence of jumps, but by how their sizes are distributed across scales.

Scientific discoveries do not always come from carefully planned laboratory experiments; sometimes they begin with simple observations. This study started when Alkali-Activated Fly Ash Concrete (AAFAC) blocks were placed on a backyard lawn, without realizing their unintended impact on vegetation. Over time, the vegetation near the blocks became pale, weak, and eventually disappeared. Further observation suggested that alkaline compounds slowly leached from the AAFAC into the soil, increasing the pH to levels (10–12) that most plants cannot tolerate. To investigate this observation, three plots of land were prepared with different amounts of crushed AAFAC (0 kg/m 2 , 1 kg/m 2 , and 3 kg/m 2 ). The results were clear: after three months, the untreated plot showed normal weed and grass growth (average weed height 7 cm), the moderate treatment plot showed reduced growth (2 cm weeds and weak grass), and the high treatment plot was nearly bare (about 1 cm weeds and no grass). Since outdoor conditions include environmental variability (rain, temperature, insects, and soil differences), a controlled indoor experiment was conducted to isolate the effect of AAFAC. Six identical pots of alfalfa were grown for six weeks under the same conditions using three soil mixtures: 0% AAFAC, 10% AAFAC, and 25% AAFAC by weight. Plant growth and overall health decreased steadily as the AAFAC content increased. Both the outdoor and indoor results show that crushed AAFAC creates a high-pH soil environment that prevents vegetation growth. This finding highlights a simple and previously overlooked application of AAFAC for long-term vegetation control, while also offering a practical way to reuse large amounts of coal ash that would otherwise be landfilled.

Hands-on lab components are an integral part of biological science courses at the college level, as they develop students' technical skills, problem-solving abilities, and critical-thinking skills. During the COVID-19 pandemic, instructors were required to devise strategies for providing hands-on lab experiences through remote instruction. This study reports the successful implementation of hands-on lab activities using at-home custom Carolina lab kits along with McGraw-Hill Connect Virtual Biology (MHCVB) Labs. A total of 220 students from 10 sections of microbiology courses were selected for MHCVB or without MHCVB. As part of the Fall 2020 course, three sections (66 students) were instructed to perform labs at home using lab videos. MHCVB Labs were used along with instructor demonstrations during the Spring 2021 semester. Students assessed their knowledge through pre- and post-quizzes and lab skills through lab reports. No significant differences were observed in student performance on pre-lab quizzes, post-lab quizzes, or laboratory reports between the Fall 2020 and Spring 2021 semesters. In contrast, significant improvements were observed in hands-on technical skills during Spring 2021. Evaluation of student images showed that streak-plate proficiency increased from 57.7 ± 2.5 to 80.1 ± 7.6 (P < 0.05). Similar improvements were observed in simple staining (57.3 ± 11.6 to 74.4 ± 6.4; P < 0.01) and Gram staining (55.0 ± 8.7 to 80.1 ± 6.4; P < 0.001). Student proficiency was assessed by normalizing total scores to a 100-point scale, enabling direct comparisons between groups. These results demonstrate that integration of virtual laboratory simulations enhances hands-on microbiology skill development in remote laboratory courses and supports blended laboratory models across instructional modalities.