TY - JOUR
T1 - Reforming a Large Foundational Course
T2 - Successes and Challenges
AU - Talanquer, Vicente
AU - Pollard, John
N1 - Funding Information:
The development of the CT curriculum began in 2007 with the support of a grant from the National Science Foundation (DUE-CCLI). These resources were used to create major components of the curriculum that were pilot-tested, evaluated, and revised at the University of Arizona (UA) and Pima Community College (PCC) in 2008 and 2009. From 2010 through 2014, the CT curriculum was used in two sections (∼240 students each) of the general chemistry course for science and engineering majors at the UA taught by the curriculum developers. During this period, the curriculum was refined and data were collected to compare performance of students enrolled in conventional and reformed sections. These data included results in a full-year ACS standardized final exam24 and students’ grades in the subsequent organic chemistry course. Additionally, different educational resources were developed to support the full implementation of the curriculum including a textbook, a set of baseline class notes, laboratory guides, web-based interactive simulations, educational videos, and assessment tasks (many of these resources are available online23).
Funding Information:
We acknowledge the support of the National Science Foundation (NSF) through Grant DUE-0736844 and from the Association of American Universities (AAU) through their Undergraduate STEM Education Initiative. We want to thank all of the general chemistry instructors who have been involved in the CT project, as well as the undergraduate preceptors and graduate teaching assistants who have collaborated in its implementation over the years. The continuous support from the staff in the Teaching Support Services in the CBC Department is greatly appreciated. We give special thanks to Gail Burd, Senior Vice Provost for Academic Affairs at the UA, who has been a relentless supporter of the CT project.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 The American Chemical Society and Division of Chemical Education, Inc.
PY - 2017/12/12
Y1 - 2017/12/12
N2 - Calls for educational reform in undergraduate STEM education have become more prominent in recent years, particularly in introductory/foundational courses. Such reform efforts were initiated 10 years ago in the general chemistry program at the University of Arizona. In this contribution, we describe the major successes and challenges encountered during the full implementation of a new chemical thinking curriculum across all sections of a large course serving thousands of science and engineering majors every year. Besides describing the goals and structure of the alternative curriculum, as well as its impact on student learning, our work seeks to provide insights into institutional conditions, resources, and constraints that foster or hinder the success of major educational reforms.
AB - Calls for educational reform in undergraduate STEM education have become more prominent in recent years, particularly in introductory/foundational courses. Such reform efforts were initiated 10 years ago in the general chemistry program at the University of Arizona. In this contribution, we describe the major successes and challenges encountered during the full implementation of a new chemical thinking curriculum across all sections of a large course serving thousands of science and engineering majors every year. Besides describing the goals and structure of the alternative curriculum, as well as its impact on student learning, our work seeks to provide insights into institutional conditions, resources, and constraints that foster or hinder the success of major educational reforms.
KW - Collaborative/Cooperative Learning
KW - Curriculum
KW - First-Year Undergraduate/General
KW - Inquiry-Based/Discovery Learning
KW - Second-Year Undergraduate
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85038218069&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85038218069&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1021/acs.jchemed.7b00397
DO - 10.1021/acs.jchemed.7b00397
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85038218069
SN - 0021-9584
VL - 94
SP - 1844
EP - 1851
JO - Journal of Chemical Education
JF - Journal of Chemical Education
IS - 12
ER -