Shining a Light on Diversity: Scientist Spotlight • by Scott Mandia (Professor of Meteorology)

Like Jean Anastasia, students in Scott's MET103 Global Climate Change course also engage in a scientist spotlight project.

Scott provides students with a curated list, which you can download here: MET103 Scientist Spotlight. From this list, students choose four scientists and answer a set of questions about those experts. 

As they complete the assignment, students realize that these experts look like them and like some of the same things that they do. This helps students to realize that, yes, they could also be a scientist and, even if not, scientists are not all white men in lab coats.

Scott loves reading student submissions. You can read a sample student response here—Scientist Spotlight Student Example—and adds that this kind of project can be scaled to any area of study as long as the faculty member is willing to reach out to their subject-area experts and ask them to volunteer.