BA in Natural Sciences
Program Highlights
Count of Students in Science Education Programs by Option
Count of Graduates in Science Education Program
Undergraduate Summer Research Initiative
Examining Results from Scientific Inquiry with Future Science Teachers
SCED Fall 2017 graduates, DichaPerez-Montalvo (R)and Lidia Leal (L) worked with Dr. Carolina Alvarado over the course of 10-weeks in the summer to examine the outcomes from SCED 321 (Scientific Inquiry) exploring how scientific practices that the students engaged in during the semester reflected in the students' outcomes. They each worked with a different data set, applying different methods of qualitative analysis.
Dicha analyzed students' written responses to examine how the scientific argumentation fostered in class was translated to the conversation of diversity in the STEM field. Lidia performed video and audio analysis examining how the students, leading a 30-minute teaching demonstration, engaged with their peers’ ideas to create a responsive environment. Both students have been accepted to participate in a poster presentation at the 2017 SACNAS, the National Diversity in STEM Conference.
Xochith Herrera, Angelica De La Torre, and Daniel Caravez worked with Dr. Ben Van Dusen as undergraduate research assistants over summer 2017 to examine a range of research questions including:
- How does university teachers’ prior experiences teaching a course impact their effectiveness in the course?
- How student performance and participation rates compare on low stakes assessments when administered online vs. on paper and pencil in class?
- How does the presence of near peers impact equity in introductory physics courses?
Student Presentations
Montalvo, D. & Alvarado, C. Just Science: Student Responses to Social Issues in Science. College of Natural Sciences Poster Session, California State University, Chico. April 2018.
Montalvo, D. & Alvarado, C. Just Science: Student Responses to Social Issues in Science. SACNAS, The National Diversity in STEM Conference. Salt Lake City, Utah. October, 2017
Leal, L., & Alvarado, C. Responsive Inquiry Based Learning to Responsive Inquiry Based Teaching? SACNAS, The National Diversity in STEM Conference. Salt Lake City, Utah. October, 2017
Student* and Faculty Publications
Jariwala, M., *Herrera, X., Nissen, J., Close E., & Van Dusen, B. (2018, March). Participation Rates of In-class vs. Online Administration of Concept Inventories and Attitudinal Assessments. In L. Ding, A. Traxler, & Y. Cao (Eds.), Proc. 2017 Physics Education Research Conference (pp. 196-199). doi:10.1119/perc.2017.pr.044.
Nissen, J., Jariwala, M., *Herrera, X., Close E., & Van Dusen, B. (2018, March). Performance Differences for In-Class and Online Administration of Low-Stakes Research-Based Assessments. In L. Ding, A. Traxler, & Y. Cao (Eds.), Proc. 2017 Physics Education Research Conference (pp. 272-275). doi:10.1119/perc.2017.pr.063.
*Caravez, D., *De La Torre, A., Nissen, J., & Van Dusen, B. (2018, March). Longitudinal Associations between Learning Assistants and Instructor Effectiveness. In L. Ding, A. Traxler, & Y. Cao (Eds.), Proc. 2017 Physics Education Research Conference (pp. 80-83). doi:10.1119/perc.2017.pr.015