TABLE 4.

Depiction of the four major themes (Incubator experiences, changes to teaching, language of math and biology, and intersection of math and biology) coded from focus group discussions with example quotes

Incubator experiences

Participants describe their experience being a part of an Incubator.

“One thing that I thought was so cool through this cross collaboration is that I feel like this project itself really kind of epitomizes what a student who wants an associate of science degree to come out with.”

“I still seem to sometimes use, you know, precise mathematical terms in biology class. I'm now realizing and I have to be, like, more careful in, like, my defined terms.”

“[My] Incubator group … has just been so encouraging, because a lot of times, like, I feel, like, just out of my comfort zone.”

“One of my favorite parts of the experience was being with these [instructors] we're all spread out, even at different campuses, let alone different disciplines, and so working with them, even in person, but then weekly on Zoom has been really nice.”

Changes to teaching

Participants describe how their participation in the Incubator led to changes in how they teach.

“I was able to think about the specific topics that I might not cover in my math courses that are extremely important for a biology course.”

“[Using real-life data sets] in our college, they're actually collecting this type of data so it's kind of very meaningful.”

“I will work on my class, and assessments I'll work on making modifications similar to what others did with the math piece of it.”

“I was looking at that [and] I thought really this is what my students need before they come in and do it.”

Language of math and biology

Participants describe how the terminology between math and biology should be consistent.

“I appreciate the different terminology across subject matter. I realized that while I have had many math courses, many math faculties have not had any biology courses.”

“I never realized that mass and weight were different and that sciences like biology use mass … I've only taught math using weight.”

“I can only speak for me, but I felt I learned quite a bit about the different languages both disciplines use.”

Intersection of math and biology

Participants describe the importance and benefits of integrating math and biology.

“We will develop good materials that we can use in both math and biology to strengthen quant skills for our students.”

“In my actual [math] course I'm teaching as a hybrid, I had a chance to actually discuss … to tell these students you know hey like this example that we're doing here, this could be applied in like a biology class.”

“Our faculty is interested in creating curriculum with some sort of modules or activities that really harmonizes both math and biology that could be used in both types of classrooms.”

“I think this would work great for that because what we came up with was a math activity based on the science lesson that [Incubator group members] were working on, and I can definitely see us using it.”