Our freshman chemistry program has focused on incorporating calibrated peer review, exam wrappers, and new recitation models into the program to enhance conceptual learning and problem-solving skills. Calibrated peer review incorporates writing and grading exercises to allow students to increase conceptual understanding of course material and critical-thinking skills. The exam wrappers system is being used to allow students to assess their study habits and materials allowing them to make plans on how to better use their time preparing for future exams. Unlike more traditional lecture-based recitations, our recitations are small problem-solving breakout sessions facilitated by the TA.
Our advanced labs have focused on how to keep students engaged and allow them to see the relevance of lab work to their career paths. We are developing the synthesis of a series of flavone compounds that will be used in every laboratory course in our advanced sequence, we call this “threading.” Unlike vertical integration that often focuses on incorporating instrumentation in the undergraduate lab sequence; we have chosen to focus on how the same series of compounds are used by multiple subdisciplines of chemistry. We believe that having students synthesize compounds that are used in other lab courses will allow them to see the relevance to their career goals and will be more interesting than the traditional “synthesize and discard” methods of conventional labs.
Faculty
-
-
Conjugated polymers and oligomers: stacked pi-conjugated oligomers as models for semiconducting conjugated materials, new conjugated copolymers. Polymers for bioengineering: functional polylactides, polymer brushes.
-
Sustainability and service learning in chemical education; educational technology; inquiry-based instruction; laboratory instruction.
-
-
-
-
Chemical education
-
Analytical chemistry; Laser-induced fluorescence; Capillary electrophoresis; Microfluidics; Micro Total Analysis Systems (µTAS); Astrobiology; Emergence of life; In Situ analysis; Organic analysis; Environmental analysis
-
Ribosome; translation; RNA; RNA World; RNA folding; RNA Structure, RNA electrostatics; Iron; DNA Structure; DNA-Protein interactions; DNA-drug interactions; Origin of Life; crystallography; x-ray diffraction; biochemistry; bioinformatics; biophysics
