Team:Bordeaux/Public Engagement

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Survey

Part of our Human Practice work, we have established a little survey under the form of a mini quiz. It aims to establish a state of knowledge regarding what people know about forest in general, and the resulting industry. We diffused the survey to all IGEM teams contacted by social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. As the objective was not to collect only igemers participation, we diffused the survey among our university classmates, friends and family. The survey was available under both English and French version. In that way we hoped to reach a maximum of people to establish a great overview of the results.

Survey structure

The quiz has 8 questions with 3 answers and only one is correct. At the end of these questions the participant must fill personal information fields in order to see who is participating. We asked for the age group, the country of residency and if the player is participating to the current IGEM competition or not. After sending his answers the player is assigned a mark on 8pts and he can consult a correction.

Questions theme

All questions refer to the concept of Forest in general and worldwide. Some were more oriented to how the forest are used, and how they are managed. They are listed below:

  1. Approximately how much of the total forest represents the modified natural forests worldwide ?
  2. Which country has the largest forested area ?
  3. Which country generates the most industrial profit from its forests ?
  4. What type of forest is the most represented in the world ?
  5. How many people are employed in the forest trades ?
  6. In Brazil, which activity is the most responsible in the reduction of forests ?
  7. Which country is the leader in pulp and paper industry ?
  8. Today, how are recycled sub-products from wood industry ?

Results

We collected a total of 125 answers. From these 127 participants, 60 are participating to the IGEM competition which represents 47.2%. The average mark is 2.33/8. The proportion of correct answers is visible on the histogram.

The low average mark score is indicating a lake of knowledge in most of the questions. However, it is not surprising to see such a fact as some of the questions were very specific. We can see that half of the answers from question 4 are correct. At the opposite, only 15.2% of the answers from question 6 are correct. The little score for the question 6 highlights a weakness concerning the main reason of the destruction of the biggest forest in the world; the Amazonian forest. It is surprising as we know since years now that the Amazon Rainforest is being hurt and reduced in superficies every year.

The age repartition of the participants is also significative with 80% of 18-25 years old range. This is not surprising as we, in the team, are all from this age and diffused the survey to our friends and colleagues.

What is interesting for us is the result obtained for the final question. Only 30.4% of the answers are correct. Most of the participants do not know how are recycled sub-products from the wood industry. The correct answer is that sub-products from the wood industry are burnt to produce thermal energy. However, the answers indicate that most of them think these sub-products are not recycled at all.

Regarding our project it is interesting to see that people are not aware of how forests are managed. Hence, a large work of awareness, information and documentation needs to be done so people know the potential of forest to maximize the benefits they already give us.

Thanks to the personal information field, it is interesting to see from where all the participants come from. Most of them are from France. However, we collected answers from other European countries such as Germany, England Spain, Switzerland and the Netherlands. We also reached farer countries such as Canada, USA, Algeria, but even India and Japan.

Interviews

Denis Dupuy

His website

Axel Innis

His website

Ijsbrand Kramer

From a pedagogical point of view iGEM makes some very important contributions:

  1. It is an authentic research experience, meaning it is based on a real question, students design and perform their own experiments, they interpret their results, they draw conclusions, it is open ended (they do not work for a defined outcome), and importantly, their findings may have some societal impact. These features drive students towards a mastery orientation, a goal orientation associated with deep learning (a,d,f).
  2. As a consequence, the project is motivating because it offers students a sense of autonomy, meaning that they have a high level of control of what they are doing, they iGEM offers a great sense of agency. Because of societal relevance and because of participation in a jamboree in Boston, this kind of project boosts a sense of competence. The students feel useful; they realize that education is not just to please the teacher with a good grade. And finally, because of an authentic experience and because of a team- based activity, students have a great sense of relatedness, related to each other, their supervisors and related to the discipline they have been studying for so long (d,f).
  3. The beauty of iGEM is that it offers unique occasions for educational institutions to communicate their pedagogical activities. As for scientific discoveries, universities must communicate about education, not just publishing lists of course subjects to attract students. They must make education visible, tangible and they must make it important.
  4. Lastly, many studies have shown that iGEM-type of experiences connects students tightly with the educational institute and this connection creates long lasting positive sentiments (b,c). Not only do positive sentiments or, better, the lack of stress from frustration, stimulate the plasticity of our brain (e), which makes the students more creative and productive, these sentiments also positively affect the educational institution concerned. Besides an institutional salary, engaging and masterly-oriented students are a key (motivational) reward for teachers who take their mission seriously.
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  2. Astin AW. What matters in college. Liberal Education 1993;79(4):4-12.
  3. Howard-smith J, Bryant FB, Njus D, Posavac EJ. Here today, gone tomorrow: understanding freshman attrition using person-environment fit theory. Optimal Data Analysis 2010;1:1010-124
  4. Kramer IM, Kusurkar. Science-writing in the blogosphere as a tool to promote autonomous motivation in Education. The Internet and higher education 2017;35:48-62.
  5. Lledo PM, Alonso M, Grubb MS. Adult neurogenesis and functional plasticity in neuronal circuits. Nat Rev Neurosci. 2006;7:179-193
  6. Ryan RM, Deci EL. Self-Determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development and well being. American Psychologist 2000;55(1):68-78.