ENGAGEMENT: THE IMPORTANCE OF RESEARCH-INTENSIVE EXPERIENCES

We have started a program called Go Global: Science Research at Mount Allison University. It provides high school students with the opportunity to work intensively as part of a research group for about 10 days. This analysis is based on a three-year operation of the program, starting in summer 2007. Our goal was to examine the issue of fostering student engagement through short but intensive informal (out-of-class) experiences in science. In this paper, we describe the program, our research model, and an overview of some key results. The analysis shows that it is possible to have a significant positive impact on students in a short period of time (~10 days), both in changing their viewpoints about scientists and in providing a positive learning experience of authentic science.