Scope of this Paper
For the purposes of this paper, we borrow from the work of Fleischner et
al., (2017) and O’Connell et al, (submitted) to define what we are
considering to be a UFE. UFEs are designed explicitly with
student learning in mind and occur in a field setting. We are not
limiting our discussion of UFEs to field biology, geoscience, or natural
history courses, as we are aware of the wide-range of disciplines with
UFEs, and aim to be inclusive of these experiences.
The authors of this paper are members and founders of the Undergraduate
Field Experiences Research Network (UFERN; www.ufern.net), a NSF-funded
Research Coordination Network focused on fostering effective UFEs. UFERN
brings together diverse perspectives and expertise to examine the
potentially distinctive learning and personal growth that happens for
students when they engage in UFEs across the range of disciplines and
formats. During a UFERN meeting (2019), it became apparent that
undergraduate field educators from across disciplines were frequently
requesting help in how to collect empirical evidence about complex
student outcomes from UFEs (O’Connell et al. 2020). The work presented
here emerged from conversations at that UFERN meeting and is a
collaboration between STEM education researchers, social scientists, and
undergraduate field educators from multiple disciplines, to directly
address calls for guidance on assessing UFEs.