Assessment of reforms in the physical chemistry laboratory at Texas A&M University

CHED 1468

Simon North, swnorth@tamu.edu, Holly C. Gaede, hgaede@mail.chem.tamu.edu, James D. Batteas, Dong Hee Son, dhson@mail.chem.tamu.edu, Christian Hilty, chilty@mail.chem.tamu.edu, and Paul S. Cremer, cremer@mail.chem.tamu.edu. Department of Chemistry, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77842
A team of faculty is currently redeveloping the physical chemistry laboratories at Texas A&M University. The goal is to provide students with authentic inquiry experiences that equip them with the practical skills necessary in graduate and industrial research laboratories. The new experiments involve three-week modules to build expertise and culminate with a capstone experience in the final week. Experiments include laser-based emission and quenching, nanoparticle photophysics, scanning tunneling microscopy, and low field NMR. This approach contrasts with the earlier model that emphasized the illustration or reinforcement of concepts learned in the lecture course. The previous conceptual approach often resulted in “push-button” experiments and painstaking write-ups, and was not always successful in practice because of the rotating experiment schedule. The rationale for this new approach, new experiments implemented thus far, and preliminary assessment will be presented.