Recombinant Teaching: STEM Education Office Hours with Dr. Justin Shaffer

How do I scale up authentic assessments in my course?

September 17, 2026·22 min
Episode Description from the Publisher

Noah Courtney joins Justin to discuss how to scale up the use of authentic assessments (including having your STEM students write the NSF GRFP) in undergraduate courses.Noah A Courtney is a second-year Ph.D. student and NSF Graduate Research Fellow at the University of Rhode Island. At URI, he conducts Biology Education Research under Dr. Lisa Limeri, focusing on leveraging quantitative methods to investigate ways to support community college STEM student persistence. Additionally, he focuses heavily on mentorship, and serves as a mentor to multiple undergraduate students, who have gone on to give successful conference presentations, earn graduate school admission, and write successful NSF GRFP proposals.If you would like to chat further with Noah or receive his 'email guide to the GRFP', feel free to reach out at noah.a.courtney@uri.edu or through his LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/noahcourtneyHere is a link to more info on authentic assessments.Here is Justin's LinkedIn article on how he used AI to help him with his NSF GRFP assignment.Here is the paper on the FINER method (the I stands for Interesting!)Want to be a part of the show? Submit a question!Learn how you, your department, or your institution can work with Justin to improve STEM education together.www.recombinanteducation.com

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