Abstract
Traditional, faculty-mentored undergraduate research experiences (tUREs) have been shown to increase student academic and psychosocial outcomes; however, not all students are able to achieve a tURE. To increase access to undergraduate research experiences for all students, faculty in the biology department coordinated several course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) in the Sustainable Interdisciplinary Research to Inspire Undergraduate Success (SIRIUS) Project. In the sixth year of SIRIUS implementation, we conducted semi-structured interviews to 25 biology majors nearing graduation, each having completed four to seven SIRIUS courses. Interviews were qualitatively analyzed by attaching data points, “codes,” to meaningful words or phrases within the interviews, and the codes were summed based on the number of interviews in which they appeared. In this study, we hypothesized that students’ career goals and their participation in tUREs would influence their perceptions of SIRIUS. Results revealed that all 25 students perceived benefits from participating in SIRIUS; however, our hypothesis that tUREs and career goals would influence students’ perceptions was supported. Students pursuing research and healthcare careers recognized engaging in the CURE design elements equally and articulated the SIRIUS goals similarly; however, future researchers perceived SIRIUS to offer more research career preparation, and healthcare students recognized more affective gains. Those who obtained all research experience through SIRIUS perceived more gains overall than students who had also performed tUREs, most notably in communication, collaboration, and iteration. Future research will investigate curricula to determine if particular courses influence specific student responses.