Discovery for All: Empowering Inclusive Communities in Integrative Biology
We are pleased to announce that our department has received a Berkeley Discover Departmental Innovation Award that provides funding to help transform our undergraduate curriculum to include more authentic, discovery-based learning experiences. The project is led by Robert Full, your co-chairs, our IB instructional and advising staff, and multiple student representatives. Funded by a generous gift from the Chernin family, the goal of Berkeley Discover program is to create a new framework for the undergraduate experience in which students embark on a journey of creative exploration from the moment they arrive on campus. To make such experiences more accessible to all students, we will create an early, welcoming "on-ramp" that empowers students to embark on the discovery process. Students will become members of an inclusive community built around original, creative exploration. Collectively, these transformations will make discovery-based undergraduate experiences more accessible to all students. With additional support from our Dean of Biological Sciences, the program will launch three interconnected efforts that promote curiosity (authentic discovery), community (a sense of belonging to enduring peer networks), and careers (translation of the Berkeley experience to diverse professions). Collectively, these efforts will pave the way for broad scale change in undergraduate education at Berkeley and beyond.