What college chemistry instructors and high school chemistry teachers perceive as important for incoming college students

Abstract

Professors of college chemistry were asked to rank various examples of traditional chemistry knowledge and skills as to their importance for incoming students to possess. A pilot study revealed that the items-all selected from one edition of the American Chemical Society-National Science Teachers Association (ACS-NSTA) Chemistry Achievement Examination-represented attributes viewed as relatively unimportant. The professors then identified 29 personal traits they considered more important for incoming students to possess. Subsequently, these items, knowledge, skill, and personal attributes, were included in a three-part assessment instrument. The instrument was administered to 69 college chemistry professors selected at random and to 37 high school chemistry teachers. The results reveal that the college professors universally identified student personal attributes as significantly more important for incoming students to possess over specific knowledge and skills included in the ACS-NSTA Achievement Examination. Chemistry professors do not find items commonly used to assess success in high school chemistry as important attributes for incoming students to possess. Conversely, high school chemistry teachers regard the knowledge and skill items to be more important for college preparation than personal attributes. 0 1994 by the National Association for Research in Science Teaching Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.CCC 0022-4308/94/070735-131. Ability to relate mathematical concepts to chemistry problem solving. 2. Ability to carry out accurate measurement in the metric system.

An Analysis of the High Attrition Rates among First Year College Science, Math, and Engineering Majors

“…However, these notions about the nature of undergraduate science are not based on systematic exploration (Seymour & Hewitt, 1997). A variety of studies have been conducted in order to tease out the variables that contribute to a student's decision to switch from an SME major (e.g., Daempfle, 2000;Loftin, 1993;McShannon, 2001;Razali & Yager, 1994;Seymour & Hewitt, 1997;Strenta, Elliott, Russell, Matier, & Scott, 1994).…”

“…Post-secondary teachers design their introductory courses with certain assumptions about the academic characteristics of incoming students (Mitchell, 1990;Razali & Yager, 1994). Secondary faculty develop curriculum to prepare students for successfully engaging in college SME courses.…”

“…Secondary faculty develop curriculum to prepare students for successfully engaging in college SME courses. According to studies by Daempfle (2000), Mitchell (1990), and Razali and Yager (1994) on college and high school SME faculty expectations, post-secondary instructors were shown to have different expectations for incoming student characteristics than secondary preparation addresses.…”

Success in introductory college physics: The role of high school preparation

“…The research literature points to a profound "impedance mismatch" between precollege and college science courses' pedagogy and content, in spite of the Herculean preparatory efforts of many high school teachers (Dickie, 1991;Razali & Yager, 1994;Shumba & Glass, 1994;Warkentin et al, 1993). College and precollege teachers differ in the depth and structure of their content knowledge, which may add to the confusion and frustration of students in transition to college .…”

“…Science teachers view their high school physics courses as valuable preparation for introductory college physics, yet many college professors have expressed doubts about their worth (Gibson & Gibson, 1993;Halloun & Hestenes, 1985;Razali & Yager, 1994;Shumba & Glass, 1994). Who is right?…”