Abstract
The Virtue Project (VP) and the Biofilms and Biodiversity Project (BBP) together form an excellent union of student-driven research, education and outreach focused on the participation of teachers and students in primary and secondary education. The design of the educational tool is simple. Clear plastic discs are mounted on a plastic pipe rack and placed in different aquatic ecosystems for various lengths of time to monitor colonisation of species (biofouling). The VP/BBP provide a versatile tool that supports the connection between fieldwork and classroom pedagogy to better inform students about local and global water quality issues and biodiversity. VP/BBP promotes teachers to include current scientific results in their teaching, since there are numerous scientific works that are based on the same basic principles: to study biofouling on different shaped substrates. In addition, the projects promote teacher collaboration, as it connects different subjects (e.g. biology, mathematics, physics, chemistry, arts, languages) and offers online educational support (e.g. biodiversity calculator, data sharing platform, species group identification guide) and the possibility of international school collaboration. In addition, the VP/BBP fulfils goals of national curricula and is an excellent vehicle to promote Ocean Literacy Principles (OLP), specifically, OLP #1, OLP #5 and OLP #6. Since its inception, the BBP Website has attracted over 75 countries and the site has been downloaded thousands of times. The VP Website has attracted over 80 countries over the years and currently there are over 180 registered users from Sweden, Spain, UK, Germany, Portugal and USA.
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Frederick, J.A., Gotensparre, S., Jacobs, D., Källström, B., Olsson, M. (2019). The Virtue Project and the Biofilms and Biodiversity Project: An International Collaboration in Marine Science Education. In: Fauville, G., Payne, D., Marrero, M., Lantz-Andersson, A., Crouch, F. (eds) Exemplary Practices in Marine Science Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90778-9_16
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