Designing tools to help students conduct their own research

Are you interested in building high school students’ science and data literacies by supporting their authentic inquiry?

MindHive is a web-based community science and educational platform that supports virtual Student-Teacher-Scientist-Community (STSC) partnerships for human brain and behavioral inquiry. We are looking for a highly organized and detail-oriented intern to support our interdisciplinary team of educators, UX designers, high school students, developers, social psychologists, neuroscientists, community organizations, and educational researchers. (More about MindHive below).

Your role

Based on your skills and goals, you may support or lead a range of tasks involving educational and UX research, data analysis, curriculum and technology design, web design and maintenance, communications, and/or software development.  There are a ton of options and angles, so let’s talk to see what would be the best fit for you!

Your skillset

• Our goal is for you to strengthen your skills in the area you desire by working closely with our diverse team of experts and learners.

• We are looking for an intern who is passionate about education and educational technology, community science, environmental science, and/or data literacy; and who is committed to understanding and supporting learning among underserved youth. 

• Prior experience with data analysis, web programming, neuroscience or psychology, citizen science, curriculum development, and/or project management is an asset, but not required. 

Join the MindHive team and help us make a real impact on the way that high school students engage with data in their scientific inquiries.

Position Logistics:

• Please note this is a hybrid (mostly remote) position and it is currently unpaid.

• Meeting structure: weekly check-ins and meetings (typically on Thursdays).

About MindHive

MindHive is a web-based community science and educational platform that supports virtual Student-Teacher-Scientist-Community (STSC) partnerships for human brain and behavioral inquiry, following an Open Science philosophy. Users can explore and participate in studies created by their peers and scientists, build their own projects using a block-based design approach pulling from a public database of validated tasks and surveys; and generate research proposals using an interactive proposal canvas. Teachers can create and invite students to a class, view platform activity of their students, and create assignments using the My Classes page. MindHive Connect will be a ‘dating tool’ for schools, science mentors, and community organizations across the country with similar interests and research/civic goals. By involving young citizen scientists in each other’s projects through peer-review and data collection, they will learn that scientific progress is a collaborative, iterative, and transparent process. 

MindHive is managed by the RIDDLE Lab at New York University’s Educational Communication and Technology program and the NYU Max Planck Center for Language, Music, and Emotion at NYU’s Graduate School of Arts & Sciences.

For more information, see the project descriptions below, read our CADRE spotlight.

Ongoing MindHive Projects

MindHive is supported by the National Science Foundation (#1908482 and #2241751) and the National Institute of Mental Health (SEPA).

Environmental Neuroscience for All

Environmental Neuroscience for All will combine online and in-person tools to support authentic research experiences for socio-culturally diverse student teams from both urban and rural schools across the US, who will work with scientists and civic partners to design studies that explore the relationship between our brains and our environment (How is our brain health and wellbeing affected by our environment? Can we help improve how we behave toward our environment by deepening our understanding of how the human brain is wired?). The curriculum, paired with an online collaboration platform and professional development materials, will cover topics that are tightly linked to NIH-funded research (How do environmental factors affect brain health? How might behavioral science contribute to public health policy?). Moreover, the program uses an “open science” and participatory science approach, training the next generation of scientists and citizens to view environmental challenges not just as barriers, but as opportunities for research, innovation, and collaboration. 

Promoting Students' Data Literacy through the Creation of Interactive Multimodal Representations of Biometric Data 

This project will promote data literacy in high school students by engaging them in learning about the Quantified Self -- the practice of using technology to track and reflect on one?s own biological, behavioral, physical, and/or emotional data. Learning activities will be designed to spark a broad interest in science and to help develop students? informed opinions about the role of human-generated data in public life. To achieve this goal, the project will develop and test software tools as well as lesson and professional development materials with which students and teachers can explore, analyze, and create novel, multimodal, and interactive representations of data, recorded by wearable biosensing devices. Students will learn about how data from their bodies can be captured and interpreted through hands-on STEM activities that include the creation of interactive data representations. Students will design and execute small exploration projects to answer their own questions and create offline and online artifacts to communicate their findings. Students will engage in discussions that consider the privacy implications of using data-fueled services, applications, and technologies and critically evaluate how their personal data is being used. During and after the project, instructors and students will have opportunities to connect with industry partners who work with biosensing and wearable technologies, and to access career and college readiness resources relevant to these and related data technology fields. Read more about the project here.

Developing Data Engagement Tools for Students and Communities

Data analysis and interpretation is a critical challenge in behavioral citizen science activities. In a series of interdisciplinary workshops to explore and conceptualize student-centered data engagement tools for MindHive.  Our interdisciplinary co-design activities are anticipated to help deepen all stakeholders’ understanding of student and participant data engagement needs and define gaps and challenges in current tools to support these needs. Research activities will elucidate how students may best engage with, understand, and contextualize human cognition and behavioral data; and how interactive data analysis and visualization tools can help promote equity in data literacy and the goals of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). By bringing together teachers, scientists, data science learning researchers, and nonprofit partners, the proposed activities will further help identify best practices for co-design in human behavioral data science.