Special Section: Foundational Concepts and Assessment
Tools for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Educators,
Part 1: Essential Concepts and Skills
Introduction: Promoting Concept Driven
Teaching Strategies in Biochemistry and
Molecular Biology
From the †Northeastern University, ‡University of Alabama,
§University of Delaware, ¶University of California Santa Barbara,
||HHMI, ‡‡University of Richmond
The American Society For Biochemistry And Molecular
Biology (ASBMB) long ago (about 10–12 years) recognized
both the changing nature of Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology (in reality all of the molecular life sciences) and the
ways we need to educate our students (not just our science
majors but all students) in the molecular life sciences. All
students need to appreciate and understand the broad con-
ceptual areas of the discipline, the interdisciplinary nature
of much current and future science, as well as the process
of science in terms of both its approaches to problems and
the cross disciplinary foundational concepts that can con-
tribute to a clearer understanding of life processes, goals
that align well with those of vision and change [1].
A major rationale for this is that modern molecular life
science is increasingly interdisciplinary, both from the con-
ceptual perspective and from the experimental perspective,
and that the advances of the future will increasingly be
made at the interface between the disciplines [2]. Students,
therefore, need to understand both foundational discipli-
nary concepts and how they relate to broader interdiscipli-
nary concepts as well as broad themes from the allied field
disciplines of Chemistry, Physics, Mathematics, and Com-
puter Science in addition to process of science skills that
are often common to all the scientific disciplines. This pla-
ces an increased emphasis on presenting the essential con-
cepts and themes from the allied fields in the context of the
molecular life sciences, either in traditional Biochemistry
and Molecular Biology courses or in the currently emerging
“blended” courses [3–5] that bring together the foundations
of Chemistry, Physics, and Mathematics/Computer Science
in the context of the molecular life sciences.
*Address for correspondence to: Department of Chemistry, Gottwald
Science Center, University of Richmond, 28 Westhampton Way, Rich-
mond, Virginia 23173. E-mail: jbell2@richmond.edu
Received 26 July 2013; Accepted 30 July 2013
DOI 10.1002/bmb.20726
Published online in Wiley Online Library
(wileyonlinelibrary.com)
Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education
Carla Mattos†
Margaret Johnson‡
Hal White§
Duane Sears¶
Cheryl Bailey||
Ellis Bell‡‡*
The Society has developed a three pronged approach to
supporting the appropriate changes in academia to focus
on student centered education of all students in the molec-
ular life sciences. These involve:
1. Building a network of scientists and educators focused
on using and disseminating evidence-based teaching
best practices.
2. Fostering both an understanding of the use of appro-
priate assessment, and the creation of a network of
educators focused on defining the foundational con-
cepts of the discipline, identifying key cross-
disciplinary principles, and incorporating the appropri-
ate skills necessary for students to succeed in the
practice of science into the curriculum and assessment
of student outcomes.
3. Promoting best practices in the education of our students
by providing appropriate teaching and assessment
resources for faculty.
To address these challenges ASBMB applied for, and
was awarded, a grant from the National Science Foundation
(The Undergraduate Biology Education track in the Research
Coordination Network program (RCN-UBE) Award number
0957205 “RCN-UBE: Promoting Concept Driven Teaching
Strategies in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology through
Concept Assessments,” Ellis Bell, PI). As part of this project,
the Project Steering group was split into three groups, one
focusing on the foundational concepts of the discipline, one
on critical concepts of the allied fields of Chemistry, Physics,
and Mathematics, and one on the necessary skills (in their
broadest sense) that a student should have upon graduation.
These topics were discussed extensively over the past 2 years
in a series of regional workshop meetings involving hun-
dreds of educators from a wide variety of institutions includ-
ing major research universities, liberal arts colleges, and
minority serving institutions geographically located across
the country, and well attended sessions at both the Annual
Experimental Biology National Meeting and the ASBMB
sponsored small education meeting.
287

The three papers presented in this special section
resulted from the working group’s analysis of the input
from these meetings. They include some sample learning
objectives with the goal of guiding future efforts of the pro-
ject to develop assessment tools aligned with this consen-
sus. The titles of the papers are:
“Foundational Concepts & Underlying Theories for
Majors in ‘Biochemistry and Molecular Biology’” John T.
Tansey, Teaster Baird Jr., Michael Cox, Kristin Fox, Jenni-
fer Knight, Duane Sears, and Ellis Bell.
“What Skills Should Graduates of Undergraduate Bio-
chemistry and Molecular Biology Programs Have Upon
graduation?” Harold B. White, Marilee A. Benore, Takita
F. Sumter, Benjamin D. Caldwell, and Ellis Bell.
“Essential Concepts & Underlying Theories from
Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics for ‘Biochemistry
and Molecular Biology’ Majors” Ann Wright, Joseph Pro-
vost, Jennifer A. Roecklein-Canfield, and Ellis Bell.
These three papers represent a consensus of the knowl-
edge and skills that biochemistry and molecular biology
majors should have upon graduation with a degree in bio-
chemistry and molecular biology or, (recognizing the exis-
tence of separate degrees) biochemistry. We have not sug-
gested how this might be taught in terms of individual course
content recognizing that there are a wide variety of combina-
tions of courses that together in a program might accomplish
the overall goal of students mastering these areas and skills.
We would also encourage the use of this framework when
considering the design of courses for non science majors.
The Society’s RCN-UBE grant is now focusing on align-
ing the identified conceptual areas and skills with the
288
Biochemistry and
Molecular Biology Education
development of appropriate assessment tools and the crea-
tion of a web-based toolkit for educators. We have
suggested some sample learning objectives in the three
papers, not to be prescriptive but to illustrate the types of
learning objectives that can then provide a basis for devel-
oping appropriate questions that can be used to gauge stu-
dent understanding. We hope that these three papers will
help focus the community’s efforts both on curricula reform
to align both course and program curricula with the con-
cepts of “Vision and Change” and promote the use of
assessment tools that are aligned with the appropriate
foundational disciplinary and interdisciplinary concepts, as
well as skills, necessary for our students to successfully
complete their undergraduate education.
References
[1] AAAS, (2012) Vision and Change in Undergraduate Biology Education: A
Call to Action, AAAS, Washington, DC. Available at http://visionandchan-
ge.org/finalreport/.
[2] Bell, E. (2001) The future of education in the molecular life sciences, Nat.
Rev. Mol. Cell Biol. 2, 221–225.
[3] Caudill, L., Hill, A., Hoke, K., and Lipan, O. (2010 Fall) Impact of Interdisci-
plinary undergraduate research in mathematics and biology on the
development of a new course integrating five STEM disciplines. CBE Life
Sci. Educ. 9, 212–216.
[4] Gentile, L., Caudill, L., Fetea, M., Hill, A., Hoke, K., Lawson, B., Lipan, O.,
Kerckhove, M., Parish, C., Stenger, K., and Szajda, D. (2012) Challenging
disciplinary boundaries in the first year: A new introductory integrated
science course for STEM majors. J. Coll. Sci. Teach. 41, 44–50.
[5] Ulsh, L., Drew, D. E., Purvis-Roberts, K. L., Edwalds-Gilbert, G.,
Landsberg, A. S., and Copp, N. (2009). Accelerated integrated science
sequence (AISS): An introductory biology, chemistry, and physics
course. J. Chem. Educ. 86, 1295–1299.
Introduction