mississippi course redesign initiative department of biological sciences mary celeste reese the...
DESCRIPTION
Each semester, ~200 students enroll in each course. 2 conventional lectures are delivered weekly for 50 minutes each. Students acquire notes through PowerPoint slides. Labs meet once per week for 2 hours and involve watching videos and performing simple lab exercises.TRANSCRIPT
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Mississippi Course Redesign InitiativeDepartment of Biological Sciences
Mary Celeste Reese
The Replacement Model:Plants and Humans
Animal Biology
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Plants and Humans and Animal Biology are the most popular non-majors science courses at MSU.
Because of constraints, a bottleneck typically occurs.
3 primary factors contribute to bottleneck:1.Lack of wet lab space. 2.Lack of large lecture halls.3.Lack of resources to hire additional
instructors. Finally, there is a lack of interactive learning
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Each semester, ~200 students enroll in each course.
2 conventional lectures are delivered weekly for 50 minutes each.
Students acquire notes through PowerPoint slides.
Labs meet once per week for 2 hours and involve watching videos and performing simple lab exercises.
![Page 4: Mississippi Course Redesign Initiative Department of Biological Sciences Mary Celeste Reese The Replacement Model: Plants and Humans Animal Biology](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022051202/5a4d1b7a7f8b9ab0599b8ad9/html5/thumbnails/4.jpg)
To reduce the bottleneck ◦ How? By reducing the number of lectures per week to
1 but keeping 2 sections.◦ Enrollment can be doubled.◦ We converted wet labs to virtual labs.◦ Students’ lab time spent in open-schedule, emporium-
style computer labs staffed by GTA’s to assist them. To create a more interactive course and inspire
life-long learning in the sciences.◦ How? In-class time spent in active-learning exercises
like case studies and group discussions.◦ Course content delivered through Blackboard.
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Currently, we are running one in-class section per week.◦ In class time is used to do application-type
exercises Virtual labs are up and running: students
complete a virtual lab exercise (created by publishing company) delivered through Blackboard.
Students then take a quiz on the completed lab assignment at a designated time in a computer lab.
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Grant idea seemed the perfect fit for the issues we were facing in our 2 non-majors courses: the bottleneck and limited lab space.
Enrollment in the courses was completely dependent on these factors.
Also, we saw an opportunity to create more interactive and engaging science courses.
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Faculty Support:◦ Department head saw this grant as a way to
alleviate the issues we were facing.◦ Tenure-track faculty reviewed our grant proposal
prior to submission. All were onboard.
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A newly formed peer-teaching committee has been formed.
Through the action of this committee, I hope to show colleagues the benefits of our redesign.
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Initially, some administrators (and advisors in other departments) had a difficult time with the class schedule format.◦ Why is class meeting once per week?◦ Why are labs meeting for 25 minute intervals?
With some explanation about the redesign’s attributes, specifically its cost effectiveness, those administrators are not asking questions anymore.
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“Support” has been positive. Because we were able to increase
enrollment at no additional costs, admin were happy.
Currently, a committee has been formed by our college to look at ways departments can cut instructional costs ◦ = NCAT
Our redesign has recently gained attention with increasing budget cuts.