Abstract
A loss of over half of the students who enter college intending to pursue majors in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) occurs within two years of taking their first college science class (Seymour and Hewitt, 1997; Mervis, 2010). Among the many reasons why students decide to leave the sciences within the first twoyears are that (1) introductory courses are uninspiring, and (2) courses fail to foster a sense of scientific identify in students and (3) immersion in the sciences means sacrificing an education that incorporates teaching practices from multiple non-science disciplines (Seymour and Hewitt, 1997). Many universities have recognized the need to advance introductory science teaching for undergraduates. Introductory laboratory courses have employed interdisciplinary project-based labs that address real-world problems and grant students the independence to influence experimental methodologies. Some non-majors courses approach science from a liberal arts perspective; however,
few initiatives intended for science majors have combined these approaches into one course. To address this, a multidisciplinary research practicum was developed for Brandeis University’s Introductory Biology and Organic Chemistry laboratories.