Some Issues in Biology Teaching

Author(s): David L. Nanney

Source: BioScience, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Feb., 1968), pp. 104-107
Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Institute of Biological Sciences
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Some
Biology Teaching
I have not come here today as an
"expert," prepared to expound the
CUEBS "party line." Indeed, if CUEBS
has a party line I have been unable to
discern it. Rather, CUEBS appears to
be dedicated only to the proposition that
teachers of biology have serious prob-
lems, that only they are capable of per-
ceiving those problems clearly, and that
only they can solve those problems. The
chief technique of problem solving
espoused by CUEBS is contained in the
proposition that one can make fire by
rubbing heads together. Each of us is
limited - by our discipline, by our local
institutional situation, by our own pecu-
liar experiences. Our hope is simply that
by pooling our individual insights we
may gain a clearer perception of the
nature of the problems and, in concert,
learn better how to accomplish the tasks
set before us. My contribution cannot,
therefore, be unique except in the sense
that each of us has a unique contribu-
tion to make. I will simply attempt to
verbalize some of the issues that are
apparent to me, and hope that they are
of sufficient generality to provoke a
confrontation.
InformationalIndigestion
The central problem is one which
might be called "informational indiges-
tion." Our discipline is being crammed
with an unprecedented amount of new
information. But it has not caused us
to grow sleek and fat, but only dyspep-
tic and acutely uncomfortable. We do
not have the metabolic machinery to
assimilate and deploy the countless
goodies which are daily piled upon our
groaning tables.
The author is a professor in the Zoology
partment, University of Illinois. This talk was
prepared for the Louisiana Conference on Under-
graduate Education in the Biological
held at Louisiana State University,
October 13 and 14, 1967.
104
Issues
in
David L. Nanney
This problem is new only in degree.
While browsing in the library at Woods
Hole a few years ago, I ran across an
1892 issue of "The Collecting Net"
containing an address by E. O. Whitman
-one of the founding fathers of
American biology. It had a very modern
sound except in detail. Whitman was
complaining about the number of papers
being published. He said he was having
a hard time reading critically all the
papers published in biology and had
almost had to give up on geology and
chemistry except for general reviews. It
is hard for us late arrivals to compre-
hend the extent to which science has
been transformed in the last half cen-
tury. We are living in a very different
kind of world than that of the turn of
the century. Fernandus Payne, my
graduate dean at Indiana University,
was a student at Columbia in the first
decade of this century. For many years
he was one of the most successful re-
cruiters of emerging talent. The secret
of his success was simple; he made a
point of knowing personally all the
zoologists in the United States, prefer-
ably before they completed their gradu-
ate studies.
It is useless to know his secret now,
because his technique is impossible to
apply. We hear estimates to the effect
that half of the scientists who ever lived
are still alive. Moreover, federal support
since the last war and improved instru-
mentation have increased the productiv-
ity of the individual enormously so that
it is probably true that the amount of new
information generated by scientific ac-
tivity doubles in each decade. Even if
I had learned all that could be known
De-
as a graduate student -20 years ago-
Sciences,
I could have learned only a quarter of
Baton Rouge,
what is now known. The increase in
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understandingis not uniform, of course;
some areas have scarcely changed in
fundamentals while whole new sub-
sciences have emerged and burgeoned.
One of my colleagues,interestedin pro-
tein synthesis, was curious about the
rate of obsolescence of information in
his field, and attemptedto measure the
rate of advance.He definedas a measure
of obsolescence- and hence of advance
- the concept of the "citation half-
life." For how long after a paper is
published is it still referred to by col-
leagues of the author?I do not remem-
ber the exact results of his analysis, but
the half-life of paperspublishedin 1950
was approximately6 years; papers pub-
lished in 1955 had accumulatedhalf of
their citations in only 3 years. The half-
life of papers published in 1960 had
dropped to about one and a half years.
Thus, in certain areas the information
given a graduate student at the begin-
ning of his career is inadequate at the
time of his prelims.
No wonder so many of us wander in
frustration through the library, thumb
in confusion through Current Contents
each week, or stare distractedly at
mounting piles of unread reprints, pre-
prints and symposiumvolumes.
Change in Emphasis
The problem is not, however, simply
one of quantity. Biology has undergone
dramatic and fundamental changes in
emphasis. To try to make this point, I
am going to indulge in a bit of pseudo-
history.
The 19th century was the first to
produce a significant number of pro-
fessional biologists. One thing that im-
presses me about this period is its
catholicity. The same individual would
work on plants and animals, on micro-
and macroorganisms,in pure and ap-
plied areas. A biologist was often also
a chemist, a physicist,or a geologist and
made importantcontributionsin several
areas. This catholicity is well illustrated
by the title of one of the first professors
in one of our land-grantcolleges in the
midwest: he was designatedas Professor
of Botany, of Natural Philosophy and
of the Diseases of Women and Children.
This breadthof understandingbrought
its rewards. We owe the 19th century
several of our still valid "grand generali-
zations." I think of Louis Pasteur and
his ferments and his germ theory of
disease, of Virchow and the cell doc-
BioScience
trine, of Mendel and the concept of the
gene, of Darwin and the idea of natural
selection. These were not narrow con-
structs of limited applicability, but mind-
stretching ideas which attempted to com-
prehend the universal properties of liv-
ing systems across the face of the earth,
violating taxonomic boundaries, and
reaching back to the beginnings of bio-
logical time. They provided a clear
focus and a steady vision of the bio-
logical sciences as a whole and unified
discipline.
The situation in biology changed
subtly, however, at the turn of the cen-
tury. Information continued to accumu-
late at an accelerated pace; understand-
ing also continued to advance in selected
areas, but the overall pace of generaliza-
tion lagged behind the stockpiling of
facts. Generalization is the technique
the human mind employs to order and
make accessible large masses of infor-
mation. Without adequate synthesis, the
factual burden became too great for
any biologist to carry. And the age of
specialization began. For reasons which
are perhaps obvious, biologists began to
sort themselves into groups represent-
ing the kinds of organisms with which
they were primarily concerned. Journals
were devoted to plants or animals or
microbes; societies were organized for
botanists or zoologists or bacteriologists.
Academic departments and educational
programs were established with an or-
ganismic focus. Botanists and zoologists
no longer talked to each other, and
even more detrimentally, they didn't
even talk to the same students.
An Era of Synthesis
The third era in biology began to
emerge after the last war. Technological
advances began to make possible the
solution of problems which for 50 years
could only be described. And the solu-
tions cut across the academic barriers
which had been erected. New disciplines
sprouted and flourished; new societies
were established; new journals were
founded; and nearly all completely dis-
regarded taxonomic boundaries.
The new synthetic era is clearly upon
us, but its task is only well begun. The
accumulated tons of descriptive and
factual information have only begun to
Le assimilated. No biologist today can
yet claim to be a generalist, because the
generalizations are not yet available. The
new syntheses have not yet brought a
reunification of biology, but have only
February 1968
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caused it to fragment in a different way.
The current programs are obsolete; but
the proper shape for the programs of
the future is not clear. A crucial prob-
lem being debated is simply "What
should we teach?"
To confound the problem of assimi-
lation, as if it were not enough to have
to train our students in all kinds of
organisms and at all levels of biological
organization, we are confronted with
the fact that biology has moved into a
position of ever greater dependence
upon the physical sciences and mathe-
matics, both for ideas and techniques.
We can no longer claim to be even
competent biologists if we ignore
the insights of the biochemists, the
instruments of the physicists, and the
sophisticated analytical techniques of the
mathematicians. Indeed, biology has
sprawled in all directions to such an
extent that its boundary lines are blurred
and almost indefinable. Within a fixed
and constant 4-year regimen we now
demand for our students more physics,
more chemistry, and more mathematics,
as well as a broader and deeper intro-
duction to biology than most of us re-
ceived as graduate students. Meanwhile,
of course, we expect them to receive
a truly liberal education so that they
can escape our own limitations into
broadly humane perspectives on the
human condition.
Institutional Inertia
Before coming to grips with the slip-
pery problem of what to do about
biology in a transitional era, I want to
mention three other problems. One of
these is "institutional inertia." Even if
we could agree today about the proper
content for biological curricula, about
the most appropriate sequencing of sub-
jects, about the ideal packaging of
biologists into administrative units,
about the best techniques and laboratory
facilities for instruction, years would
probably elapse before the changes
desired were effected. And by that time
the consensus would have changed as
the discipline evolved. Human institu-
tions have been selected primarily for
their stability - to provide cultural con-
tinuity as individuals come and go. This
function is not to be underrated, but it
poses a particularly frustrating impedi-
ment in a period of rapid cultural
change. A revolution provides only a
temporary alleviation. What is required
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is a new institutional pattern designed
not for stability, but for flexibility, one
which is capable of changing systemati-
cally and sensitively as a discipline
develops. A few years ago academic
compartments of botany, zoology, and
bacteriology reflected reasonably well
the structure of biological science. Per-
haps today - with our preoccupation
with "levels" - an appropriate organi-
zation would have niches for cellular,
organismic, and population biologists.
But 10 years from now, who can predict
the nature of the predominant affinities?
I am perfectly willing to grant that
form and function in academia are not
perfectly linked; that power does not
flow according to organizational charts;
that obsolete structures can foster pro-
gressive programs. But this is only to
admit that unusually gifted individuals
can surmount difficulties of circum-
stance. Organizational structure is im-
portant, and what seems most important
for biology today is an organizational
structure capable of systematic and
progressive modification.
Individual Obsolescence
Another problem, related in a way
to the previous one, is that of "individual
obsolescence." However much we em-
phasize the dual role of achieving and
transmitting human understanding, the
fact is that the major role of the teacher
throughout human history has been that
of the transmitter. The teacher has been
one of the chief conservators of tradi-
tion and information. Most of us are
reservoirs and not well-springs. In times
past a teacher could fill his cup as a
student and dribble out its contents to
his own students throughout the years.
Acquiring a few lovable idiosyncracies,
an occasional fresh anecdote, and mis-
cellaneous scraps of hard information,
the teacher grew old in honor and dig-
nity. This system worked admirably so
long as the half-life of knowledge was
long in relation to a teaching career.
If, however, the half-life of biological
information is only a decade, less than
a quarter of the teaching span, a teacher
who is only a passive transmitter is not
effective for long even at that. And he
knows it, because his younger colleagues
and his students know it. He grows
frustrated and embittered as his self-
esteem erodes. He resists curricular
changes, because they expose his inade-
quacies, and he becomes an obstruction.
105
The only solution to this professional
crisis (which is certainly not unique to
teachersof biology) is that every teacher
seriously commit himself to a regimen
of continuing scholarshipand reject the
role of passive transmission. This, of
course, requiresnot only a commitment,
but the facilities- the librariesand the
laboratories, and most importantly the
time. One of my mentors claims that he
has never felt any conflict between his
teaching function and his researchfunc-
tion. He gives his 40-hours per week to
teaching, counseling students, preparing
lectures, attending committee meetings,
and writing reports, and then puts his
other 40 hours of working time into his
research program. Unfortunately, few
of us have his stamina, his dedication,
and his dedicatedwife. At a time when
the laborer makes a living with shorter
and shorter working hours and the pro-
fessional makes a living with longer and
longer working hours, some social
adjustments are required if we are to
have the professionalniches filled at all.
Meanwhilewe will just have to scramble
like crazy to keep on top of our jobs.
Student Heterogeneity
One other confounding problem,
selected from many, is "studenthetero-
geneity." Human variety is not a new
discovery; we have always recognized
innate differencesin general and special
skills, and their augmentationby social
factors. But until the recent past we did
not - as college and universityinstruc-
tors- have to cope with more than a
small part of the spectrumof variation.
The campus gates were narrow and
selected a few relatively homogeneous
groups. As teachers of biology we
mainly confronted the future farmers
and the aspiringmedics, usually in care-
fully segregatedclassrooms.There were
also the preciousfew who aspiredto the
lofty and lonely profession which we
ourselves represent, but these were
tenderly nourishedin our private offices
and laboratories. The situation has
changed dramatically. Ever-increasing
proportionsof the potential college stu-
dents are becoming actual college stu-
dents, and even larger proportions of
college students are continuing into
postgraduateprograms.Although many
of the incoming students continue to be
as
trained poorly as those of the past, tion of the nature of our problems and
others are receiving all the presumed discuss briefly what we are to do about
benefits of the postsputnik reaction. them. Obviously, the biology that is
106
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Some students enter college now with taught in our colleges and universities
calculus,BSCSbiology,2 yearsof solid correspondsvery imperfectlywith the
chemistry, and a glib sophistication
gleaned from a regulardiet of Scientific
American. Thus, the input has greatly
diversified;the studentsfrom the ghettos
of the cities, the rural consolidated
schools, and the plush suburbanpalaces
are not equivalent in their starting
points and cannot be effectively sub-
jected to the same routines.
Not only do the studentsdifferwidely
in their backgroundsand in their capac-
ities, but they differ greatly in their
objectives.The limited numberof niches
previously available to professional
biologists have been augmented by the
technological revolution sweeping our
society, and new kinds of specialtiesare
being added constantly- from areas
involving space biology, populationcon-
trol, environmental pollution, genetic
and bio-engineering,to mention a few.
We cannot train homogeneous students
for some small number of well-
defined professionalobjectives.We can-
not impose on all students an ideal
program constructedon the assumption
that all of them belong to the top 10%
of their cohort, and that all of them are
going the same place.
Finally, we are constrained, I hope,
to recognize that most of our under-
graduate teaching in biology is not
directed to presumptive biologists at
all. The "generaleducation"course has
all too long been feebly justified only
as a recruitingground for professionals.
The students have been considered"the
unwashed masses" and their instructor
has been selected for his inexperience
(and lack of leverage) or has been
demoted to the task for his manifest
incompetence.These attitudesand these
practices, I maintain, provide evidence
of a serious distortionof our value sys-
tem, and we require a new dedication
to the concept of liberal studies. We
may also need new devices and a free-
dom from narrow professionalism if
we are to comunicate to an educated
populace an understanding of the
nature of scientific activity and a recog-
nition of science as "the characteristic
art form of Western Civilization."
What We Teach
Let's turn away from this considera-
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biology accumulated in our libraries.
It is equally obvious that we are not
capable of teaching everything that is
available. We cannot teach all the ma-
terial taught 50 years ago and every-
thing discoveredsince. We must render
value judgments.I do not want to ad-
dress the question of precisely what we
teach, but I will comment on some ap-
proaches to what we teach. Actually, I
believe that what we teach (in a narrow
factual sense) may be less important
than our approachto our discipline.We
should perhaps abandon the idea that
biology is a body of knowledge (a prod-
uct) in favor of the idea that biology
is a cultural activity (a process).
ClassifiedApproaches
I have classified approaches to cur-
ricula into four groups. The first I
designate as the "Lame Duck Ap-
proach." Recognizing that we are in a
transitionalperiod in which the future
cannot be confidently projected, some
urge the maintenance of the tried and
true. The same materials are taught in
the same way and in the same sequences
as they were in 1940. New materials
are placed in new courses to be taken
by advanced students after they have
been exposed to classical biology. This
has led, for example, to programs in
which 40-50 hours of undergraduate
biology are required,to the exclusion of
mathematics, physics, and chemistry.
The only possible way in which this
approachcan be successful is to require
a much longer period of training, and I
do not want to tilt with the windmill
of a 4-year college education, or sug-
gest an increased period of graduate
servitude.
The second approach I designate as
the "Cross-sectional Approach." The
entire corpus of classical studies is dis-
carded and replaced by materials as-
sembled from ScientificAmerican, Life,
Time, and the local newspapers. The
objection to this approach is that it
provides stimulation without nourish-
ment, and it projects an entirely false
notion of the natureof scientificactivity.
A capsule summary of the latest ideas
provides no understandingof science as
a cultural activity. Scientific activity in
a continuing stream and a "thin slice
of the contemporaneous,"as one biolo-
gist puts it, provides no understanding
BioScience
 of where science came from or any basis
for projecting its future course. The
cross-sectional approach is "modern"
and fashionable, but provides a poor
foundation upon which to build a
future.
The third approach I refer to as
"Tunnelling." It can be applied to either
undergraduate or graduate programs.
Students are not given a thin veneer of
biological understanding, but are ex-
posed in great depth to a very narrow
segment of biology. (The narrowness of
some of these tunnels provides new in-
sights into the constrictability of the
human mind. I have known molecular
geneticists, for example, who have never
heard of meiosis.) Students emerge
from their tunnels
magnificently
equipped to do one thing. The trouble is
that by the time they emerge, the thing
they are equipped to do has often al-
ready been done, or shown to be un-
necessary, and they are stranded without
any perspective. The hot problems 10
years from now will be different and
the tools will be different. Training by
tunnelling is training for immediate and
short-lived purposes. It is planned obso-
lescence, perhaps appropriate in a
throw-away society, but costly in long-
term human values.
The final approach is the "Synthetic
Approach." It does not attempt to im-
pose on students all the time-honored
facts, but it does try to give insight into
historical processes in science. It does
not attempt to give the latest develop-
ments in all branches of biology, but it
does try to communicate much of the
modern flavor - and an appreciation of
its ephemeral nature. It does not pro-
vide expertise comparable to that of
tunnelling, but it provides more perspec-
tive and greater flexibility which should
equip students to participate longer and
more meaningfully in the scientific
endeavor. Finally, the approach is a
commitment to understanding, as dis-
tinct from information, and its objective
is to produce continuing scholars, and
not static reservoirs.
I do not know how to achieve Utopia.
If I did know, you would not believe
me. I do hope that you will believe the
assertion that our discipline has changed
profoundly and that our teaching must
change, our institutions must change,
and we ourselves must change. To de-
termine how we can and must change
is the continuing task of this conference.
February 1968
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Biosatellite I
The symposium will be sponsored
jointly by the Space Science Board of
the National Academy of Sciences and
the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration to present to the scien-
tific community the results of Bio-
satellite II. Interested scientists are in-
vited to attend without advance reg-
istration. The meetings will be held in
the Great Hall of the Academy, 2101
Constitution Avenue, NW, Washington,
D.C., on February 23 and 24.
The chairman will be Dr. Kenneth
V. Thimann, Provost of Crown College,
University of California at Santa Cruz.
The investigators responsible for the
13 Biosatellite II experiments will pre-
sent papers discussing the results and
significance of their experiments and
will answer questions. The current sta-
tus of USSR and USA biosatellite pro-
grams will be discussed early in the
program.
Biosatellite II was launched Septem-
ber 7 and recovered September 9, 1967,
the duration of its orbit cut short one
day because of anticipated weather
problems in the recovery area. Its pur-
pose was to study the effects on bio-
logical systems of the unique factors
of the space environment, particularly
weightlessness, weightlessness combined
with a known source of gamma radia-
tion, and the removal of living systems
from the direct influence of the Earth's
periodicity. The following experiments
were conducted:
General Biology
1) To determine the effect of weight-
lessness on the growth and orienta-
tion of roots and shoots of wheat
seedlings.
2) To determine the effects of zero
gravity on the emergence of wheat
seedlings.
3) To determine the effects of weight-
lessness on the orientation of roots
and shoots of wheat seeds.
4) To determine the effects at the
cellular and subcellular level of
weightlessness on developing frog
embryos.
5) To determine the effects of weight-
lessness on plant growth through
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Symposium
measurements of the angle between
leaf and stem of a pepper plant
which is controlled by the plant
hormone, auxin.
6) To study in the amoeba (Pelomyxa
carolinensis) the effects of zero
gravity on the orderly synchronous
division of nuclei and on the for-
mation of food vacuoles and utili-
zation of ingested nutrients.
Radiation
7) To examine the effects of radiation
and zero gravity of embryonic
differentiation and development of
the pupae of Tribolium (flour
beetle).
8) To study, following recovery, the
effects of radiation and zero grav-
ity on the rapidly growing cells
of newly-hatched larvae of Droso-
phila (fruit fly) as they hatch into
adults.
9) To determine the effects of zero
gravity on radiation-induced dam-
age (mutation and chromosome
breaking) in mature reproductive
cells of a known genetic strain of
female Drosophila previously
mated with known genetic males.
10) To determine the influence of
radiation and zero gravity on mu-
tation processes in budded stalks
of Tradescantia (blue-flowering
plant) by observing induced color
changes.
I) To evaluate the extent of genetic
changes in the progeny of male
Habrobracom (parasitic wasps)
mated after exposure to several
levels of radiation during zero
gravity.
12) To determine the chromosomal
mutations in Neurospord (bread
mold) following exposure to a
known gamma source during zero
gravity.
Inquiries should be directed to Dr.
Herbert G. Shepler, Space Science
Board, National Academy of Sciences,
2101 Constitution Avenue, NW, Wash-
ington. D.C. 20418
107