Welcome! Thank you for taking the time to watch our "Algae Grows the Future" video! This video introduces pre-college, first year engineering students, K-12 students and educators to fundamentals of engineering and various engineering disciplines via the use of algae. The topic stimulates critical thinking as to how a microbe like algae can revolutionize the world in the future by its multi-faceted use. This project also exposed students to topics related to social justice, racial-gender biases, and ethics in engineering. Please visit our website for resources.

We are excited to receive feedback from you regarding:

1.  What did you learn about the project from this video?
2.  Can you incorporate/adopt the activities?

We welcome any general comments/questions as well. We hope this video sparks your curiosity about how algae can grow the future. 

A very interesting and informative video which will inspire students to further investigate this very important multi-dimensional topic.

The first-year engineering students that participated in this project really enjoyed the ability to be able to see the algae grow and observe how its growth changed as a function of the conditions that were selected.  Of particular interest was the integration of social justice related issues and how different populations around the world could benefit from this unique resource to meet their needs.

Great video!  What a great way to introduce a variety of technical topics in addition to social justice, climate change and sustainability.  It looks like this interdisciplinary project would be easily adaptable in many different contexts.  

What a great way to expand the impact of research beyond the fundamentals. You have inspired many and I am sure they all appreciate it.

Jahan –

Thanks for your ambitious work in such a salient topic! Literally a quickly growing are in the realm of engineering, sustainability and economic aspects of such things as aquaculture/mariculture. In the work focused on practice, how have you evaluated the efficacy of the hands-on experiments and adjunct curriculum in this work? There is so much negative press about algae blooms and their use as an indicator of decline in water quality, even changes in affect and misconceptions would be interesting to hear about.

That is an excellent comment. We will add activities related to HABs and algae misconceptions. I appreciate your feedback.

 

Thank you for sharing this intriguing project working at multiple levels of the K-16 education system. I was curious to learn more about what kind of algae you are using, and how the experimental setup differed from elementary to middle to high school classrooms. Also, I would be interested in hearing more about how students made the connection between the algae experiments and the simulation -- this seemed like an interesting way to build a more sophisticated understanding. Can you share more about the learning goals for students at different age levels, and how you go about assessing them?

We actually obtained local pond water and grew the algae by adding nutrients via commercial fertilizers for the school outreach activities to keep it simple. We noticed over the years with our K-12 outreach that many kids love getting their hands wet with algae experiments while some did not. So the virtual platform gave us the ability to teach students that engineers can also develop cool games for teaching and learning. So our overarching goal was to expose K-12 students and educators to engineering careers by using something that is familiar to all. Biology and environmental education is common and required at all grades in the schools. As such, we felt that algae would be a great example to stimulate thinking and excitement. The experiments are also very cost effective and the multi-faceted use of algae from fish food to energy makes it appealing. We use pre and post surveys in the schools to assess impact of our activities. Also teachers provided us feedback via surveys also.

I love the simplicity of algae and how it allows students to explore their own questions in a cost-effective manner. I would love to know more about the training you do and how you help instructors use algae as a platform to support equity and inclusion.

Dear Michael,

Thank you for watching our video. We have a K-12 resource page posted at http://users.rowan.edu/~jahan/ECT/Algae.htm.

The experiments are simple enough that the teachers just need half a day training. Almost all schools around the country teach students microbes and want to invest in Project based learning. So this project is simple yet carries a powerful message. Our webpage shows how we tied issues like gender/race/ethics/poverty/malnutrition etc to the core scientific fundamentals. For example, when deisgning an experiment we talked about Stephanie Kwolek and Rosalind Franklin-how one was confident and the other was less confident. Hope this helps. Feel free to contact us if you have more questions.

Some publications that maybe useful to the community:

Jahan, C. Bodnar, S. Farrell, Y. Tang, I. Noshadi, CS Slater  DS Miller (2019) Improving Students’ Learning Behaviors through Hands-on Algae Based Project, ,Intl.Journal Engg Education, Vol 35, No. 5,Pages1343-1352.

 K. Jahan, Roisin Breen, Patricia Hurley, Erin Pepe, Jaiyun Shen (2018) An Algae-Based Curriculum for Globally Conscious Engineering Education, International Journal  for Cross-Disciplinary Subjects in Education, Volume 9, Issue 1, ISSN 2042-6364 (Online)​.

K. Jahan, R. Breeen, P. Hurley, M. Mittenzwei and D. Murray (2017) Algae Based Engineering Education, Proceedings of the World Congress on Education, Dublin, Ireland, July 2017.  Best Extended Abstract Award.

K. Jahan, R. Breen, P. Hurley, M. Mittenzwei, D. Boileau and D. Murray  (2017) Algae Grows the Future, Proceedings of the 2017 Annual ASEE Conference, Columbus, Ohio

K. Jahan, R. Breen, P. Hurley, M. Mittenzwei, D. Boileau and D. Murray  (2017) Development of Algae-based Experiments to Teach Engineering Concepts, Proceedings of the ASEE Middle Atlantic Conference at Morgan State University, April 8th, 2017.

 

Tang, Y. and Hare, R. "Adaptive Narrative Game for Personalized Learning" IEEE International Conference on Service Operations and Logistics, and Informatics , 2019 10.1109/SOLI48380.2019.8955069    Tang, Ying and Liang, Joleen and Hare, Ryan and Wang, Fei-Yue "A Personalized Learning System for Parallel Intelligent Education" IEEE Transactions on Computational Social Systems , v.7 , 2020 10.1109/TCSS.2020.2965198   

Well paced and engaging presentation with an impressive scope and reach for the project!  I was pleased to see the references to environment and conservation, water management, waste treatment and connections to society and justice.  By nature of the STEM for All event, these presentations often take the feel of promotional videos/statements.  I am wondering what issues you have run into and how you are trying to resolve them.  What can you tell us about the project team and how you work together?  How far along are you in the project timeline and what would you change if you were to start over with the knowledge you have now?  These points might be helpful to others attracted to the idea of using algae in their educational and professional development programs.  

This June is our last month for this three year grant. In the pandemic we ran into issues of moving to online delivery. As the university was under lockdown for a while last year, maintaining our algae was a little challenging. I would ensure that there is a project coordinator as it is a lot of work to coordinate with educators to visit their classrooms. This maybe more unique to my situation as I also became department head when the award was charging full steam. I also believe that we could have trained faculty from the humanities and social sciences about the project and they and their students would enjoy it too. That is what I would change if I had to do it over again. Everyone should encourage the next generation to understand concepts of sustainability, green engineering, alternate energy and pollution prevention.

What an awesome project! It was inspiring to see how complex engineering ideas were made simple to engage students of various ages. Well done!

What a novel and holistic way to teach Engineering! 

I loved the video. It was sssssssssso interesting.

Thank you. What part was interesting?

Great to see someone highlighting algae's current use and future potential as a sustainable material instead of just an icky nuisance! Our research is focused on targeted growth of  filamentous algae but we had not come up with any activities for outreach yet. What age range are you targeting? Are their any HSE concerns you have to deal with? Would be interested in learning more about the activities and potentially incorporating them in our work! It meshed very well with our work on engineering as altruism and the engineering grand challenges (see our video).

Very educational video. Watched it with my 4 year old, now he wants to get some algae to try making algae gel 

Best feedback ever. I am happy that the video is getting 4 year old kids excited. Thank you for visiting and watching our video.

Algae is amazing and we hope it helps to build a cleaner and more sustainable future. Thank you for raising awareness about such a cool topic!

Excellent 

This video is very informative and knowledgeable. Through this video the information you are transmitting, will transform the learner. This will change our mother nature for good. Due to COVID 19 pandemic we know the importance of oxygen. Algae can be the game changer.

Very interesting and thought provoking video. The project will not only inspire students of US, but also students of Asian countries, where we have abundance of sun light to grow algae.

Thank you for visiting and watching our video. Lots of potential in countries that have water and sunlight.

 

Thank you for this presentation. The environment is so important. There are many ways to use algae. It can be applied to different grade levels in K-12. 

 

 

Thank you so much for visiting our site. Please feel free to visit our resources page.

This is such an exciting project! I really like the emphasis of the three main objectives that you outlined in the project description. How will this algae work continue as we emerge from a year of virtual/hybrid teaching and learning?

Thank you for visiting our video. We will continue this project beyond the term of the grant by offering it to our first year engineering students as part of their First Year Engineering Clinic course.

For K-12 outreach we will offer activities through our nationally recognized Engineers on Wheels initiative.

Kudos to you and your research lab!

This is truly revolutionary!!!

I have piloted this program with my students and I can say firsthand that students enjoyed the activities and they learned a great deal about how we can change the future and protect our planet through science and engineering uses for algae!!!

Thank you Lisa. I hope we can bring it back this Fall. We also spent time making many activities virtual.

Kudos on such an effective project at inspiring students in engaging in scientific studies, and also getting them the experience in a real world application that they could actually continue to follow or chose to be actively engaged with.  I am super impressed by the student evaluations noting the large gains in interests (10%-85%).  I don't have a question, as several of mine have already been asked previously - just congratulations and thanks for the work you are doing.

I do appreciate the initiative taken to dig-out the possibilities of utilizing the Nature's abundance of resources that the God has created and left for meeeting the needs of the mankind, nature, environment, and so on; by using  those resources directly, and / or transforming; or utilizing as a guide for finding other possibilities. 

In my opinion, the video could have some more information, that could help in making more impact on the people's idea and inclination to the object and objectives of the "Algae Grows the Future".

Hope for its advancement and coming for the benefit of human beings, and environment.

Thanks Kauser Jahan and your team.

Choudhury Naser, M. Eng., P. Eng.

I do appreciate the initiative taken to dig-out the possibilities of utilizing the Nature's abundance of resources that the God has created and left for meeeting the needs of the mankind, nature, environment, and so on; by using  those resources directly, and / or transforming; or utilizing as a guide for finding other possibilities. 

In my opinion, the video could have some more information, that could help in making more impact on the people's idea and inclination to the object and objectives of the "Algae Grows the Future".

Hope for its advancement and coming for the benefit of human beings, and environment.

Thanks Kauser Jahan and your team.

Choudhury Naser, M. Eng., P. Eng.

I really liked the  video. I also think the title said it all, ‘ Algae Grows the Future’. Very aptly titled. The diverse uses of Algae is very promising worldwide specially in a developing country like ours Bangladesh. 
Rjahan,teaching O- level chemistry 

great project and great future

excellnt

Innovative way of engaging kids in science topic. The video game part was really exciting!

Innovative way of engaging kids in science topic. The video game part was really exciting!

You are doing such incredible work. Amazing feat of engineering. 

Thank you so much for visiting our site and watching our video!! 

This is an interesting and innovative initiative to promoting engineering themes to K-12 students using a widely available organism. I'm curious as to how you address the climate crisis in these modules-what are some ways algae can help prepare us for a warming wold? Conversely, how do you frame the beneficial uses of algae while acknowledging the dangers posed by harmful algal blooms? My final thought is regarding the relation between algae and human health- do any of your modules discuss or explore the risks posed to human health via consumption of algae containing toxins (that may lead to diarrhea, fevers, headaches, etc)?

I look forward to hearing more about the future of this project. Where do you see this work 5 years from today and what impact do you imagine it will have on young minds?

This is great work and a wonderful video!! 

Kauser,

I thought this was an excellent video discussing your wonderful idea to inspire young minds. Do you assess/survey students about their interest in environmental engineering pre/post implementation of these modules? And do you discuss other disciplines that are involved in this type of research (i.e. environmental science, environmental health, chemistry, etc) or solely focus on engineering?

Best regards,
Dr. Tariq Ahmed, PE

Our main focus of the project was to shine light on the useful applications of algae. There is a module dedicated to how algae can cause taste and color issues in drinking water, and also the need to curb nutrient discharges as they promote HABs. Harmful toxins that are detrimental to human health are also discussed.

The world is rapidly changing in terms of alternate energy sources and  use of green engineering products. We are hopeful that this project will promote critical thinking.

Dr. Jahan,

I was wowed by the different experiments shown in this video and really liked the cool part with the algae gels. Are those materials commercially available for those of us who want to try it out?

Sodium alginate and calcium chloride are readily available for the preparation of algae gels. The algae gel modules is very popular with children. It is also a cool lesson in chemistry and chemical reactions.