Merryn Cole, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
Biography
Merryn Cole is an assistant professor of science education and came to the College of Education in 2017. She earned a Ph.D. in educational studies (with a science/STEM Education emphasis) from the University of Kentucky in 2017. Prior to coming to UNLV, she taught high school science as well as college chemistry. Her interests include the content understanding and self-efficacy of practitioners of science communication and/or science outreach and the impacts on their audiences. Merryn’s work has been funded previously by the NV Department of Education and NASA NV Space Grant. She has been published in various scientific journals and books including Education Sciences, International Journal of Environmental & Science Education, Physical Review Physics Education Research, Journal of Educational Research, and Journal of Education in Science, Environment, and Health. She has also co-authored a book on project-based instruction through Springer Nature (2019).
Research Expertise
Cole's current research interests focus on the understandings of and motivations for college science students engaging in research, particularly around their planning, implementation, and assessment of outreach activities.Her past research interests have focused on the relationship between spatial thinking and science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) content as well as the ways in which teachers understand and implement project-based instruction and the impact of implementation on students' understanding of STEM content.