Course Redesign ePortfolio Showcase

The primary goal of this project is to achieve greater student success in two of our bottle-neck chemistry courses through Supplemental Instruction sessions. Analysis of the showed an improvement of the overall course grades for those students who attended more than 25+% of the SI sessions offered. As a matter fact, these students did score (on average) one letter grade better than the "non-SI goers". And regular "SI goers" who attended 80+% of the sessions made an average of 90+%. A similar trend was observed in another quarter.

This course is designed to provide an introduction to the basic concepts and ideas of chemistry and demonstrates how they are applicable to every day processes. The basic knowledge of chemical principles and scientific literature developed in this course will allow students to read about science and technology with some degree of critical judgment.

In AY 2013-2014, we redesigned CSUF's second semester General Chemistry course, CHEM 120B, which includes concurrent lecture and laboratory components. Serving as a required pre-requisite for Chemistry, Biochemistry, and Biology majors, as well as for many other students pursuing career paths in the health professions, total course enrollment is limited by a lack of space and materials in the laboratory component. Additionally, the course had a high average failure rate (C- or lower) of 23% due to what we suspect are poor topical parallels between the laboratory and lecture lessons. Our redesign of the course involved a complete rewrite of the laboratory portion of the course, which included the incorporation of a virtual laboratory component to complement the students' wet lab experience. The pilot year of our redesign proved successful in increasing the average passable rate of the course, and so we were granted additional support funding to continue our work.

Organic chemistry is historically a course with a high failure/repeat rate. A contributor to poor performance in the course is a lack of preparedness and/or the inability to apply knowledge about fundamental concepts learned in general chemistry to new material in organic chemistry. This project will evaluate students' understanding of key general chemistry concepts critical to success in organic chemistry during the first week of the course to 1) allow students to assess their own preparedness; 2) provide advising and resources for students deemed at risk of failure to help them remediate deficiencies early in the course; and 3) encourage enrollment in the recitation session linked to the course. This project was a team effort with the other members being Ken Nakayama (Chemistry 220A lecture during Fall 2014 and Spring 2015), Jason Schwans (Chemistry 220A lecture during Fall 2014) and Elaine Bernal (Chemistry 224 instructor during Fall 2014 and Spring 2015).

Organic chemistry lecture courses are traditionally among the high failure rate courses in collegiate curricula across the nation. During the spring semester of 2014, we developed an "early warning" protocol for organic chemistry II lecture in which students thought to be at risk of failure were referred to the college advising center for remediation during the first week of classes. This project is a continuation of that effort in which we instituted this early warning system for organic chemistry I lecture. In our early warning protocol, a competency exam was administered during week one where the exam encompassed material from general chemistry I and II lecture that were deemed to be particularly relevant topics to organic chemistry instruction. Students with poor performances on this exam were strongly urged to seek advice from the college academic adviser and the lecturer and also enroll into a weekly recitation session (CHEM 224) so that their deficiencies could be addressed and confidence in the course material developed. The passing rate of CHEM 224-enrolled students were compared to that of non-224 enrolled students for courses offered in the fall of 2014 and spring of 2015.

Organic chemistry is historically a course with a high failure rate. A likely contributor to poor performance in the course is a lack of preparedness and understanding of fundamental material covered in general chemistry that is essential for success in organic chemistry. Our project aims to evaluate students' understanding of this material within the first week of the course to: 1) allow students to assess their preparedness; and 2) provide resources for students who lack the requisite understanding of fundamental material and help them remediate deficiencies early in the course. This project is a collaboration of the author of this ePortfolio with Drs. Ken Nakayama, Stuart Berryhill, and Ms. Elaine Bernal.

Organic chemistry is typically taught via the "functional group approach" that mirrors neither the way organic chemists think about their subject nor accounts for the developing intellectual requirements of the field. We have deconstructed the topics in organic chemistry into three broad categories: structure, mechanism, and synthesis. With an emphasis on making parallel the rigors of the material with the intellectual development of the students, we anticipate both an increase in student success and retention and mastery of the material.

Our long term goal is to design a STEM First Year Experience (FYE) learning community for at risk students with an identified interest as a STEM major. Our approach is to use cross disciplinary learning modules on regionally relevant issues as the core of our FYE learning community that will build the foundational critical and quantitative thinking skills required for success in typically high-failure rate STEM gateway classes including CHEM 1A and BIOL 1A. Technology will be used to facilitate timely peer-review, included community professionals in class discussions, and reinforce skills with supplementary videos.

Supplemental Instruction, a near-peer led small group, free, optional study session model developed originally at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, will be added to two Organic Chemistry II lectures, with a combined enrollment of around 100 students, offered at California State University Stanislaus one during the Fall 2014 Semester and the other during the Spring 2015 Semester. Organic Chemistry is a very rigorous science course that is required for a variety of science majors and pre-health professions which traditionally has a high percentage of repeatable grades. Supplemental Instruction or SI has a proven track record of improving student learning in difficult courses as evidenced by higher GPAs by students who regularly attended SI sessions at various Universities including our sister campus CSU Fullerton.

Traditionally, this course has a high percentage repeatable grade, F, D and W. CSU System wide has also identified this course as a bottle neck course. A proven course design Supplemental Instruction (SI) will be implemented for the two sections of Organic Chemistry I this Fall Semester 2014. Each section of Organic Chemistry I will be assigned one SI leader and the SI leader is required to attend the assigned lecture led SI session for that section.

Radical changes are required to make radical differences in the learning environment as well as radical gains in student achievement. At the beginning of the redesign all of the sections were taught using traditional lectures while the students listen and take notes. The typical pass rate (C or better) ranged from about 60 - 70% with under-represented minorities performing at the bottom. The overarching redesign theme is to utilize technology so that the learning environment is more fun and active. The most obvious course changes includes pre-recorded YouTube lectures and adaptive homework assignments. Failure rates have been cut by almost half, but the most important changes have been the positive impacts on student and instructor attitudes.

This redesign is a multi-faceted approach to improve student success and persistence in our general chemistry sequences. The cornerstone of the project is the movement of most of our general chemistry offerings into an integrated lecture/lab environment that we call the studio. The new instructional mode allows us to provide a more streamlined curriculum and provides opportunities to introduce additional opportunities for ongoing formative assessment and feedback to improve student performance. This includes the incorporation of trained upper-division students called "Learning Assistants" who act as a more knowledgeable peer and can offer students immediate feedback in person. We are also creating new software tools that allow students to get immediate feedback on course activities in real-time during class as well as outside of the classroom. Additionally, we are re-streaming the populations in the course sequences to consolidate students with similar needs and interests and redesigning the curriculum to meet those needs.

This redesign is a multi-faceted approach to improve student success and persistence in our general chemistry sequences. The cornerstone of the project is the movement of most of our general chemistry offerings into an integrated lecture/lab environment that we call the studio. The new instructional mode allows us to provide a more streamlined curriculum and provides opportunities to introduce additional opportunities for ongoing formative assessment and feedback to improve student performance. This includes the incorporation of trained upper-division students called "Learning Assistants" who act as a more knowledgeable peer and can offer students immediate feedback in person. We are also creating new software tools that allow students to get immediate feedback on course activities in real-time during class as well as outside of the classroom. Additionally, we are re-streaming the populations in the course sequences to consolidate students with similar needs and interests and redesigning the curriculum to meet those needs.

This redesign is a multi-faceted approach to improve student success and persistence in our general chemistry sequences. The cornerstone of the project is the movement of most of our general chemistry offerings into an integrated lecture/lab environment that we call the studio. The new instructional mode allows us to provide a more streamlined curriculum and provides opportunities to introduce additional opportunities for ongoing formative assessment and feedback to improve student performance. This includes the incorporation of trained upper-division students called "Learning Assistants" who act as a more knowledgeable peer and can offer students immediate feedback in person. We are also creating new software tools that allow students to get immediate feedback on course activities in real-time during class as well as outside of the classroom. Additionally, we are re-streaming the populations in the course sequences to consolidate students with similar needs and interests and redesigning the curriculum to meet those needs.

This redesign is a multi-faceted approach to improve student success and persistence in our general chemistry sequences. The cornerstone of the project is the movement of most of our general chemistry offerings into an integrated lecture/lab environment that we call the studio. The new instructional mode allows us to provide a more streamlined curriculum and provides opportunities to introduce additional opportunities for ongoing formative assessment and feedback to improve student performance. This includes the incorporation of trained upper-division students called "Learning Assistants" who act as a more knowledgeable peer and can offer students immediate feedback in person. We are also creating new software tools that allow students to get immediate feedback on course activities in real-time during class as well as outside of the classroom. Additionally, we are re-streaming the populations in the course sequences to consolidate students with similar needs and interests and redesigning the curriculum to meet those needs.

This redesign is a multi-faceted approach to improve student success and persistence in our general chemistry sequences. The cornerstone of the project is the movement of most of our general chemistry offerings into an integrated lecture/lab environment that we call the studio. The new instructional mode allows us to provide a more streamlined curriculum and provides opportunities to introduce additional opportunities for ongoing formative assessment and feedback to improve student performance. This includes the incorporation of trained upper-division students called "Learning Assistants" who act as a more knowledgeable peer and can offer students immediate feedback in person. We are also creating new software tools that allow students to get immediate feedback on course activities in real-time during class as well as outside of the classroom. Additionally, we are re-streaming the populations in the course sequences to consolidate students with similar needs and interests and redesigning the curriculum to meet those needs.

This redesign is a multi-faceted approach to improve student success and persistence in our general chemistry sequences. The cornerstone of the project is the movement of most of our general chemistry offerings into an integrated lecture/lab environment that we call the studio. The new instructional mode allows us to provide a more streamlined curriculum and provides opportunities to introduce additional opportunities for ongoing formative assessment and feedback to improve student performance. This includes the incorporation of trained upper-division students called "Learning Assistants" who act as a more knowledgeable peer and can offer students immediate feedback in person. We are also creating new software tools that allow students to get immediate feedback on course activities in real-time during class as well as outside of the classroom. Additionally, we are re-streaming the populations in the course sequences to consolidate students with similar needs and interests and redesigning the curriculum to meet those needs.

General Chemistry is a bottleneck course that is a requirement for nearly all STEM majors. Improving student success is a two pronged effort: the first to agree upon what is the target for student proficiencies, skills and attitudes for student success, and; second to decrease the number of students receiving non-passing grades. Flipping provides resources for students to use in solving the single concept problems, JITT provides a low stakes assessment of those skills and the results set the agenda for class to direct review on needed areas and problem solving strategies for more complex problems. As a secondary benefit, the on-line quiz software also includes an e-textbook at a substantial savings over the hard copy. Use of knowledge surveys and a "why are you taking this course" essay help the instructor with student prior knowledge and to develop more relevant examples.

This application is one of three applications submitted by three professors (Wayne Tikkanen, Krishna Foster, and Xin Wen) committed to working collaboratively on adapting Proven Practices to the General Chemistry sequence at Cal State LA. This cohort is half of the full-time, tenured professors who regularly teach General Chemistry at Cal State LA. The collaborative nature of this project will make it easier to institutionalize and sustain the instructional strategies. Because the strategies will be developed by a group rather than by a single individual, non-participating faculty cannot characterize the proposed changes as something impossible to institutionalize.

This projects goal is to build an in-house online homework set that works though our learning managment system, Blackboard, for CHEM 3020. By using a free option for online homework we hope to have more students do the homeowork, and perform better in the course.

This application is one of three applications submitted by three professors (Wayne Tikkanen, Krishna Foster, and Xin Wen) committed to working collaboratively on adapting Proven Practices to the General Chemistry sequence at Cal State LA. This cohort is half of the full-time, tenured professors who regularly teach General Chemistry at Cal State LA. The collaborative nature of this project will make it easier to institutionalize and sustain the instructional strategies. Because the strategies will be developed by a group rather than by a single individual, non-participating faculty cannot characterize the proposed changes as something impossible to institutionalize.

General Chemistry is an essential class for students who are considering a science career, however, for CSULB students passing General Chemistry is often a major challenge! This class traditionally had such a high failure rate (> 40% DWF) that its first semester component, CHEM111A, was targeted to become part of CSULB's Highly Valued Degree Initiative program. Now CHEM111A is a model of success. Through a combined approach of instituting a chemistry placement exam prior to student enrolment, additional training of laboratory Teaching Associates, and an increased student advising and early warning system, students in CHEM111A now average an 85 percent pass rate, and score well above the national average on the standard American Chemical Society final. In this project the same approach was incorporated into the second half of this course, CHEM111B, starting in Fall 2013. The goal was to improve overall student success in the entire year-long class.

1. Utilization of a free open source textbook. 2. Implementation of on-line homework assignments. 3. Better utilization of our current student adjunct directed sessions (S.A.I.L, Student Assistance in Learning). 4. Better utilization of our current class "Discussion Sections", through the implementation of a POGIL (Process-oriented guided-inquiry learning) type environment.

In an effort to reduce repeatable grades in general chemistry, a hybrid classroom is being implemented. Core concepts are ported to online media, and the saved classroom time is used for additional active learning techniques: group activites, discussions, and problem solving. In the second semester of the redesign, supplemental instruction is implemented to a limited degree. Overall, the redesign lowered DFW rates and increased students GPA on average. Additionally, supplemental instruction seemed to correlate with increased performance.

The online homework system ALEKS is employed in hopes of increasing student success in a first semester General Chemistry course, in response to traditionally high D/F/WU/W rates amongst at risk students. "At risk students" are defined as those students with low diagnostic placement scores, those repeating the course or those with a low grade in the department's prep-chem course.

The current online homework system shows poor correlation between homework completion percent and overall success in the course. A side by side comparison of two lecture sections, one using the current homework system associated with the text and the other using ALEKS will be made to assess the effectiveness of an adaptive online learning system which individually customizes the time-on-task learning experience for each student using periodic assessment and active problem-solving. The homework contribution to total course points will be the same for both sections, as will be required to meet weekly due dates with topics matched to the lecture/lab curriculum. A complete report on student outcomes for both sections will be reported at the end of the semester.

The online homework system ALEKS is employed in hopes of increasing student success in a first semester General Chemistry course, in response to traditionally high D/F/WU/W rates amongst at risk students. "At risk students" are defined as those students with low diagnostic placement scores, those repeating the course or those with a low grade in the department's prep-chem course.

The current online homework system shows poor correlation between homework completion percent and overall success in the course. A side by side comparison of two lecture sections, one using the current homework system associated with the text and the other using ALEKS will be made to assess the effectiveness of an adaptive online learning system which individually customizes the time-on-task learning experience for each student using periodic assessment and active problem-solving. The homework contribution to total course points will be the same for both sections, as will be required to meet weekly due dates with topics matched to the lecture/lab curriculum. A complete report on student outcomes for both sections will be reported at the end of the semester.

Chem 1110 is a challenging course and is required for a wide range of science majors including Chemistry, Biology, and many students pursuing a health related field. Unfortunately, the D/F/W rate averages around 30 – 40 % in this course. Supplemental instruction was introduced during the spring of 2014, but more intervention is needed to address academic deficiencies that some students have, which are preventing them from being successful.

The second semester of our general chemistry sequence for majors has traditionally had a large DFW rate. In an attempt to add active learning in the classroom, a majority of the lecture material will be placed online in a number of learning modules designed to enhance overall content retention and improve student attitudes.

The focus of the redesign is to reduce the D/F/W rate by improving students' attitudes about Organic Chemistry and exploring learning theory to improve their persistence. Lessons on having a growth mindset will be incorporated, as well as explicit instructions for achieving an A, B or C grade. Incentives will be given for students to form groups (Organic Learning Communities, OLC) outside of class, and structured activities will be provided for the OLCs on a weekly basis.

This course provides biochemistry fundamentals to non-biochemistry students in the biology and chemistry departments. It currently does not have an associated lab. This class is impacted and has been over-enrolled every year for the past 3 years. We will use virtual labs created by Labster Inc to provide students with virtual exposure to key concepts in biochemistry including enzyme kinetics, metabolism, bioenergetics, regulation, and protein/nucleic acid structure-function. Here we examine the effects of these virtual labs on student achievement and satisfaction in the hopes that the DFW rates will decrease, student satisfaction with the course will increase, and student self-efficacy and intrinsic motivation to learn the material is enhanced.

I will incorporate both supplemental instruction and an adaptive learning program to our second-semester general chemistry course.

Many first and second year (lower division) CSU students, in particular first generation and underrepresented minority students, tend to be less prepared in math and in physical science, which particularly hinders student success in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). Organic Chemistry provides a fundamental understanding of structural, physical and chemical properties of molecules. It bridges entry level general chemistry with higher division biochemistry and various biology courses. In the past ten and a half years (21 semesters, from Fall 2005 to Fall 2015), with a total of 1758 students taking the 1st semester of organic chemistry (CHEM 270), the average DFW rate is 34%. The course redesign aims to increase student engagement and retention, via the following three pedagogical approaches: Supplemental Instruction (SI), Classroom Response Systems (Clickers) and Online Resources.

The course is a year-long general, organic and biochemistry lecture and laboratory course sequence. As an initial step towards redesigning the 6A/6B sequence to better meet the learning objectives for the current target students, we propose to redesign CHEM 6B using backwards design principles. Thus, we will review and update the learning objectives then review the textbook and associated online homework technologies to select the best package to support those learning objectives. Significantly, we will also customize the laboratory exercises towards meeting those learning objectives, insure that the timing of the laboratory exercises are well-integrated with the timing of the concepts presented in lecture, and develop an in-house published lab manual that can be easily updated and is provided at a much lower cost. In the process of course redesign we will also review other emerging technologies, such as virtual labs, for their appropriateness for meeting student learning objectives.

The course is a bridge course intended for students who need additional preparation before attending chemistry courses counted toward their major. A course redesign is needed to strengthen this remedial science instruction with two objectives in mind: 1) for more students to successfully complete CHEM 101 which has a overall pass rate less than 70% and 2) for more CHEM 101 students to successfully complete subsequent chemistry courses (CHEM 105 or CHEM 150) with high quality grades. The course redesign uses a flipped format freeing time for in-class group based learning activities to facilitate student participation, develop problem solving skills and improve the overall retention of course content.

Organic chemistry can be an extremely challenging course for many students but especially non-science majors. The redesign of this course is focused on providing students with various opportunities to enhance their learning through in-class activities, online tutorials, supplemental instruction sessions, and traditional lecture format. This would hopefully enable students of all learning styles to understand, apply, and eventually pass the class and alleviate the need to repeat the course.

A course redesign to a Team-based Learning (TBL) format with supplement instruction (SI). is proposed because it requires student ownership of his/her own learning through active learning. Students' personal development of study stills and reinforcement of learned material will ultimately increase the student success rates for passing the course on the first attempt. Additionally, students will develop skills that will help them succeed in other college level STEM and Life Science courses.

A course redesign to a Team-based Learning (TBL) format with supplement instruction (SI), has been implemented to require student ownership of his/her own learning through active learning. Students' personal development of study stills and reinforcement of learned material will ultimately increase the student success rates for passing the course on the first attempt. Additionally, students will develop skills that will help them succeed in other college levels of STEM and Life Science courses.

Within the Chemistry department, General Chemistry I is a high demand course that has a low success rate. It appears that students have trouble retaining the concepts being tested for in the course, leading to low preparedness for a subsequent course in the series. Through implementing an online homework component, students will have real time feedback for determining if they are solving problems correctly. the goal is improved student success. The online homework system will be implemented across the multiple sections of the course, thereby improving coordination across the sections.

Our overarching goal is to enhance the General Chemistry I (CHEM 111) laboratory experience for students as a result of improved preparation for lab, a deeper understanding of the experiments and their application of lecture content; thus strengthening numerous learning outcomes of the course and increasing its success rate. This goal will be accomplished by: (1) developing a new low-cost lab manual with current and new experiments adapted to fit the manual, (2) incorporating videos, simulations, and online submissions into the student pre-laboratory preparation, along with student presentations of pre-lab lectures.

This course redesign is to adopt an online adaptive learning environment wherein students are tracked in real time in order to identify obstacles to learning, and provide remedial content. An adaptive learning environment in the form of online video tutorials, other study tools such as quizzes, and supplemental instruction are developed. The videos will be a blend of presentations of both conceptual concepts as well as problem solving calculations students need to be able to perform.

As a chemistry class, a major part of understanding the difficult lecture concepts is being able to perform experiments and analyze the data produced. The laboratory is the place where the theories discussed in lecture can come to life and allow students to be fully immersed in the scientific process. To fully improve student success in this chemistry class, the laboratory should not be ignored. The lecture and laboratory should be cohesive in the topics that are discussed and the technologies that are employed. Therefore, this redesign will be focused on blending virtual, pre-experimental preparation and wet-chemistry experiments performed in a laboratory setting.

CHEM 107 is a large enrollment General Chemistry course with a DFW rate of about 30% and significant gender and URM achievement gaps. The goal of the redesign is to move away from traditional lecture to more active learning in the classroom, as well as provide additional resources such as Supplemental Instruction, in order to improve student success across the board. To achieve this, some of the lecture content will be moved online.

A course redesign to a Team-based Learning (TBL) format with Peer-led Team Learning (PLTL) is proposed because of the promising results shown of a more than 10% increase in passing rate in our recent redesigned preparatory chemistry course. TBL requires student ownership of their own learning through active learning. The student's development of study stills and increased understanding of learned material will ultimately increase the student success rates for passing the course on the first attempt. Learning any skill takes more than a semester to develop. We believe it is important to continue developing student problem solving and study skills after their preparatory course.

Team Based Learning (TBL) trains students to take ownership of their own learning through active learning. Students' personal development of study skills and active participation in the learning process will ultimately increase the student success resulting in an increased number of students passing general chemistry I (CHEM 110) on the first attempt. As students move through the chemistry sequence with TBL they will be trained to be active learners, team players, and critical thinkers.

First-Semester General Chemistry (CHE 110) was redesigned from a lecture-based course to a team-based learning (TBL) format with Peer-Led Team Learning (PLTL). This course is the first semester of a two-semester sequence college level chemistry course for STEM, Life Sciences and other related majors. Hundreds of students need this course as a pre-requisite to continue into other advanced courses in their majors, but the high failure rate makes this difficult and impacts their graduation time. Grades from Spring 2018 were compared with grades from Fall 2015. (Fall 2015 data from Dr. Hyunjin Ko.) This data does not show an improvement in DFW rates. However, the redesign will be revised and launched again in Spring 2019.

Introductory Chemistry is a course to assist students who do not meet the prerequisites for enrollment in the first course in college general chemistry, CHEM120A. The course is designed to review basic chemistry, mathematics, critical thinking and problem solving skills that are required for success in CHEM 120A. The student population in CHEM 115 has a range of educational backgrounds in chemistry and mathematics that is very broad. The redesigned CHEM 115 is intended to address 1) the demand for the course; particularly for students who work to support themselves as they earn their degree. A hybrid version of the course is an option that could make the course available to more students; 2) the low success rate in CHEM 115. The hybrid online course will accommodate students' varied preparation for chemistry by an emphasis on mastery, engagement and interactivity.

I will create a repository of active-learning materials (LOCAL) that can be used by any Organic Chemistry instructor. Each activity will directly map to one or more SLO of the course, and the collection will be organized according to the relevant topic/textbook chapter. Each week, the instructor can select suitable activities from the repository to be implemented during a face-to-face lecture period. By working on problems in class, the instructor can model problem-solving approaches and the students will gain valuable hands-on learning. With embedded and supplemental growth mindset and study strategies lessons, students will not only be learning organic chemistry, but they will be learning how to learn.

Development and implementation of Learning Glass videos for students taking first semester organic chemistry. The new pedagogical methods introduced will include Learning Glass videos developed from the standpoint of expanding on the expected learning outcomes in introductory organic chemistry. The pedagogical methods will be implemented as supplemental instruction only and not in the main lecture session where time does not allow to demonstrate these videos.

The plan is to increase the success rate in introductory organic chemistry by changing the way students approach the learning of the topic rather than using simply memorization to pass the exams. Because the traditional course lacks instructional support such as teaching in smaller groups and Learning Glass technology, the plan is to develop a unique learning environment in order to better understand organic chemistry using appropriate tools. The goal is to increase student engagement and performance which will subsequently guide them to successful completion.

The General Chemistry (CHEM 200) course at SDSU is one of the most challenging freshmen courses on campus, with a consistently large D, F, W rate (>20%), while being a very high demand course (>800 students/semester). There are a variety of reasons for the high D, F, W rate, ranging from seniors taking the course years after any prior chemistry course, to freshmen learning to adapt to the demands of a university course load, and the challenge of active engagement of students in 500 seat lectures halls. This redesign proposal aims to facilitate active learning in the classroom, an improved Digital Homework, which focuses on student mastery of the subject matter as well as lab experiments, as well as, providing additional opportunities for peer instruction through the proven supplemental instruction model.

The General Chemistry (CHEM 200) course at SDSU is one of the most challenging freshmen courses on campus, with a consistently large D, F, W rate (>20%), while being a very high demand course (>800 students/semester). There are a variety of reasons for the high D, F, W rate, ranging from seniors taking the course years after any prior chemistry course, to freshmen learning to adapt to the demands of a university course load, and the challenge of active engagement of students in 500 seat lectures halls. This redesign proposal aims to facilitate active learning in the classroom, as well as providing additional opportunities for peer instruction through the proven supplemental instruction model.

The General Chemistry (CHEM 200/202) course at SDSU is one of the most challenging freshmen courses on campus with a consistently large D, F, W rate (>20%). The class is in extremely high demand (>800 students/semester). There are a variety of reasons for the high D, F, W rate, ranging from seniors taking the course years after any prior chemistry course, to freshmen learning to adapt to the demands of a university course load, and the challenge of active engagement of students in 500 seat lectures halls. This redesign proposal aims to facilitate active learning in the classroom, as well as providing additional opportunities for peer instruction through the proven Supplemental Instruction (SI) model.

CHEM100 is an introductory chemistry course that is meant for students who 1) take this course to fulfill a GE science course requirement, 2) do not pass a ACS placement exam that would enable them to enroll in our standard General Chemistry course (CHEM200), or 3) feel that that their high school chemistry course did not properly prepare them for CHEM200. This course consistently has relatively high DFW rates and thus is an excellent candidate for the proposed Course Redesign with Technology methods.

Current demands on resources in CSU San Marcos' Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, as well as, planned growth limit the numbers of CHEM 105L sections which can be offered in a face-to-face format. This lab class also continues to be one of the bottleneck courses for the impacted pre-nursing and kinesiology programs on our campus. By switching to a hybrid virtual plus hands-on/take-home lab model for the lab sections we will be able to offer more sections and get students to graduation with less strain on instructional lab space resources. CHEM 105 lecture schedules will need to be coordinated with the revised CHEM 105L lab schedule so this redesign is for both the lecture and the lab components.

Organic Chemistry is a difficult course because of complex concepts and a great deal of material that must be mastered in order to progress to the next courses in the curriculum. It is essential for many STEM majors but historically there has been a high DFW rate. The goal of the redesign is to increase student engagement and success thus lowering the DFW rate by incorporating the use of Supplemental Instruction, clickers, and online resources, such as instructor created videos to teach the difficult concepts and complex material.

Chemistry 1E, General Chemistry for Engineering Students, has been designed to meet the chemistry content needs of engineering students. Material is taught using engineering examples and applications, making the material more relevant to the students served by the course. The course has been reduced to 4 units (3 lecture and 1 lab), thereby reducing the unit requirement of the unit heavy major. After the first offering, access was improved with more students served earlier in their undergraduate careers and a significantly improved course pass rate was observed compared to previous engineering student pass rates in traditional general chemistry. The bottleneck in the traditional general chemistry sequence was additionally reduced by removing the engineering student demand on that sequence.

CSULB Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry launched CHEM 324 in Fall 2013 to create additional opportunities beyond lecture for small group discussions and problem solving, as well as implementing a flipped technology classroom format to engage students in an active learning environment. The redesign plan is to engage students with the material and with each other as much as possible, while using flipped technology to provide affordable learning solutions to reinforce course content.

This course will be modified to include supplemental instruction in person by peers. Additionally, screencast video tutorials will be prepared by the instructor and posted online for students to access. These screencast videos will be integrated with an already existing online homework system. The effectiveness of this course redesign will be assessed by comparison of average GPA from this semester with those from previous semesters in which I taught this course. Additional assessment will be done by comparing scores on the American Chemical Society standardized exam with scores on this exam from previous semesters.

Supplemental Instruction (SI) sessions are being implemented into the organic chemistry curriculum. SI sessions are problem-solving sessions led by a peer who has previously taken and excelled in the course. The effectiveness of this course redesign will be assessed by comparing student attendance data with student grades. Additionally, student attendance data will be compared with student performance on the ACS standardized organic chemistry exam that will be administered at the end of CHEM 333. Preliminary results in CHEM 331 indicate that student grades improve based on the number of SI sessions attended.

General Chemistry is an essential class for students who are considering a science career, however, for CSULB students passing General Chemistry is often a major challenge! This class traditionally had such a high failure rate (> 40% DWF) that its first semester component, CHEM111A, was targeted to become part of CSULB's Highly Valued Degree Initiative program. Now CHEM111A is a model of success. Through a combined approach of instituting a chemistry placement exam prior to student enrolment, additional training of laboratory Teaching Associates, and an increased student advising and early warning system, students in CHEM111A now average an 85 percent pass rate, and score well above the national average on the standard American Chemical Society final. In this project the same approach was incorporated into the second half of this course, CHEM111B, starting in Fall 2013. The goal was to improve overall student success in the entire year-long class.

In AY 2013-2014, we redesigned CSUF's second semester General Chemistry course, CHEM 120B, which includes concurrent lecture and laboratory components. Serving as a required pre-requisite for Chemistry, Biochemistry, and Biology majors, as well as for many other students pursuing career paths in the health professions, total course enrollment is limited by a lack of space and materials in the laboratory component. Additionally, the course had a high average failure rate (C- or lower) of 23% due to what we suspect are poor topical parallels between the laboratory and lecture lessons. Our redesign of the course involved a complete rewrite of the laboratory portion of the course, which included the incorporation of a virtual laboratory component to complement the students' wet lab experience. The pilot year of our redesign proved successful in increasing the average passable rate of the course, and so we were granted additional support funding to continue our work.

The online homework system ALEKS is employed to increase student success in General Chemistry, in response to increased class sizes and traditionally high D/F/WU/W rates. An efficient and effective implementation of online homework must be created using assessment feedback and policy refinement to obtain maximum student learning. Our coordinated ALEKS implementation across all course sections includes common expectations for each weekly due date, with topic counts matched to typical student learning curves; common homework policies; and common homework grade weighting. Students are supported by a TA-staffed ALEKS computer lab Monday through Friday. Initial assessment results are promising and will be reported in due time.

Our goal is to develop and implement an SI system in which SI leaders are chosen based on interactions with instructors in chemistry classes, and are trained with their peers and class instructors in addition to training from the Learning Assistance Center. Together, this approach is envisioned to foster SI leaders capable of maximizing the learning associated with SI.

In this project, incorporated a competency exam during week one with content from organic chemistry. Students with poor performance on this exam were enrolled into supplemental instruction so that their deficiencies could be addressed. The passing rate of SI-enrolled students were compared to that of non-SI students. The overall outcome of this course was compared to that for an identical course taught in spring 2012 in which no SI was available.

This redesign was undertaken to create a dietary self-assessment assignment that would streamline the grading process. While each dietary analysis was unique to each student, in depth grading of their accuracy was replaced in part by short case studies linked to automatically-graded online quizzes. Supplemental learning materials were developed to utilize the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) free SuperTracker dietary assessment tools. Steps were also taken to increase student success in this hybrid format course.

Supplemental Instruction, a peer led small model developed originally at the University of Missouri, Kansas City, will be added to two Organic Chemistry I. Supplemental Instruction or SI has a proven track record of improving student learning in difficult courses as evidenced by higher GPAs by students who regularly attended SI sessions at various Universities including our sister campus CSU Fullerton.

SI model will be implemented in two sections of General Chemistry I for the Spring of 2014 and there will be one SI leader for each section. Each student will be assigned to a lecture and is required to attend the assigned lecture and lead SI sessions for the course.

Preparation for College Chemistry (CHEM 101) is an entry-level course with a traditionally high percentage of repeatable grades (D, F, WU, W). High enrollment demand coupled with repeating students makes CHEM 101 a bottle-neck course. Supplemental Instruction (SI) increases student performance. We implemented a SI pilot project for CHEM 101 in the Fall 2013 quarter, and continued into the Winter quarter. (At the same time, SI was also implemented for CHEM 331.) Our results are positive for students who attended the sessions. Low attendance for the class as a whole needs to be improved.

This redesign project seeks to improve student engagement, both with fellow students and with the instructor in a fully online Chemistry 100. The online delivery mode is convenient for many of these students, particularly those from other campuses, as it gives them maximum flexibility.

The first part of the redesign applied to this courseis an early intervention exercise to give the students a sense of their level of mastery of important concepts from Chem 320A. A 25 question multiple choice exam was given during the second meeting of the class. Based on the results poorly performing students were asked to participate in the SI section attached to the course. This SI section is the other component of the course redesign.

This project sought to improve the pass rate in the traditionally difficult courses of organic and general chemistry. Through the implementation of SI, students served as peer leaders and mentored other students in group study sessions. Students attending these optional sessions performed significantly higher on standardized assessments and GPA than those not attending, and the gap between underrepresented students and non-underrepresented students narrowed for students attending SI. Online resources such as homework and exams led to increased student performance on standardized exams and led to students feeling more engaged in their studies than students completing written homework. These proven practices were implemented at CSU Bakersfield, CSU Stanislaus, and CSU Long Beach, and each institution has had success in their bottleneck chemistry courses.