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Chemistry
Prepared by William Fink, UC Davis,
Lead Discipline Faculty for Chemistry
Summary of Identified Issues
For the most part, articulation of chemistry majors between
community colleges and four-year institutions works well.
The greater the flow of information between the four-year
campus and its local community college feeders, the more successful
is the articulation process and the articulating student.
There are occasional problems encountered by students who
have perhaps not understood the demands of the chemistry curriculum.
As occurs in the curriculum of many science majors, the first
two years of the chemistry curriculum is spent teaching and
learning the fundamentals of the subject. The unit load of
these fundamentals is appreciable and includes the following:
- 2 years of mathematics
- 1 year of physics with calculus
- 1 year of general chemistry
- 1 year of organic chemistry
- 1 semester of quantitative analysis (if possible).
Given the curriculum demand within the major, there is little
room to satisfy general education requirements, and students
who concentrated solely on IGETC may arrive on the receiving
campus having finished little of the fundamental work for
the major. If this happens, the student's progress to the
degree will be lengthened minimally by one year, and often
by nearly additional two additional years.
While articulation of general chemistry courses between the
segments works very well, there is not the same universal
experience of good articulation for the organic chemistry
sequence. There are many historical, pedagogical, and financial
aspects reasons for this difficulty.
1. Many four-year campuses have designated organic chemistry
as an upper division course, thereby creating a barrier to
articulation to those campuses with organic chemistry designated
as upper division. To some this designation is extent historical
with the institutions; to some extent, it is pedagogical as
the course's intellectual content is very demanding. Nonetheless,
the central role that organic chemistry has assumed in many
sciences requires that students in many disciplines take it
early in their academic careers so they may build upon that
central base of knowledge. It is therefore important that
community colleges teach organic chemistry effectively.
2. The community college faculty indicated that local financial
resources were often stretched to their limits by the demands
of instrumentation purchase and maintenance. It is extremely
important that local community college administrations understand
that a commitment for quality instruction in chemistry for
their students requires the attention of full time Ph. D.
chemists as instructors and the provision and maintenance
of reasonably modern laboratory instruments.
3. The range of responses to organic chemistry for articulation
purpose varies widely with the receiving campus: Some campuses
will accept articulation only if transferring students score
satisfactorily on a standard examination in organic chemistry.
Others have different levels of organic chemistry courses
to which articulation agreements may be written. Lastly, students
sometimes perceive that it could be advantageous to get upper
division credit for organic chemistry by delaying taking it
until after transfer.
One very positive outcome of the IMPAC discussions between
four-year institution faculty and the community college faculty
has been the communication that the upper division vs. lower
division credit is truly unimportant for the academic careers
of transferring students. The accumulation of these historical,
pedagogical, and financial complications for articulation
of organic chemistry present barriers that can be overcome,
but creates difficulties for transferring students. Complicating
the articulation of organic chemistry for chemistry majors
is the fact that many other science majors need organic chemistry,
perhaps not to the level of laboratory experience and practice
that is needed by the chemistry major. Many of the receiving
campuses have instituted separate course sequences to satisfy
the needs of majors of other than chemistry, but because of
much lower enrollments, it is often not possible for community
colleges to offer more than a single organic chemistry sequence.
Additional discussions and efforts on the part of both receiving
campuses and the community colleges will be required before
a general solution of these organic chemistry articulation
issues can be remedied. The discussions this year have helped
to clarify the issues for both receiving campuses and the
community colleges.
Cross-disciplinary discussions with nursing faculty have
identified a desire on the part of the nursing faculty to
develop a one-semester course covering general chemistry,
organic chemistry, and biochemistry, with topics carefully
selected to produce the expertise in chemistry that a practicing
nurse requires. Presently there is a two-semester course covering
these topics, but because of unit caps on the nursing curriculum
as a whole, nursing faculty feel they cannot afford the typical
ten units of this course in their curriculum. Because of the
importance of chemistry as a basic science for nursing, the
nursing faculty do feel a common background in chemistry is
essential for all nurses; they hope to further this discussion
with chemistry faculty at individual campuses to develop the
ideal course.
Identified Trends/Future Directions
1. Articulation of Organic Chemistry
Most important is the internal handling of articulation of
organic chemistry courses. As this is discussed, however,
the chemistry faculty must bear in mind the need for organic
chemistry in other disciplines, and that the majority of students
in organic chemistry are, in fact, majors in these other disciplines.
While the intellectual rigor of the courses must be maintained
for these students, the laboratory need not so demanding as
for the chemistry major. Compromises for articulation may
be achievable, with receiving campuses providing additional
laboratory experience for the chemistry major, while recognizing
and accepting the articulating student's achievements in the
lecture portion of the course.
2. Nursing Discipline's Needs
Extensive local discussion between chemistry and nursing
faculty will be required if the nursing faculty's desire for
a one-semester chemistry course for nursing is to be achieved.
A major concern, particularly at smaller community colleges,
will be whether the creation of a separate course for nursing
will erode demand for the more complete two-semester course
to the point where it can no longer be offered. Other disciplinary
areas that might also be affected—e.g. nutrition and
dietetics, radiation technology, dental hygiene, and dental
assistance—may also need to be included in the discussions.
3. Distance Learning
Finally, disciplines will need to grapple with the role of
distance learning and instruction delivered over the Internet.
This is particularly important for the laboratory sciences
such as chemistry, where the hands-on laboratory experience
has been regarded as an essential component of the instruction.
4. Changes in Instructional Calendar
Changes in the structure of the academic year and the resulting
impact on instructional modes were discussed. As local administrations
experiment with innovative instructional time frames, these
aspects must be recognized.
Comments from Statewide Meetings and
the General Field
From the San Diego Regional Meeting
CSU San Marcos is presently undertaking an experimental resequencing
of the first two years of chemistry major courses from 2 semesters
General Chem followed by 2 semesters of Organic Chem to 1
semester of General Chem, 2 semesters of Organic Chem + final
semester of General Chem.
The intent of the reordering is to permit students time to
bring their math and quantitative skills up to needed levels
for the second semester of General Chemistry while enabling
progress to be made through the more descriptive material.
They expect that they will eventually dual track students,
permitting those with demonstrably prepared math skills to
follow the traditional order while using the newer order for
those students who are not yet fully math prepared. The community
college contingent sees a similar lack of math skills as an
impediment to student progress, but notes that their cadre
of students has a still lower level of preparation such that
they need both math preparation and a chemistry prep course
before entering general chemistry. This latter experience
seems similar to the level of student preparation at UC.
A very laudable grass roots movement similar in intent to
IMPAC has been active among the San Diego County Chemistry
departments. They have an annual meeting that is held in rotation
at the different institutions with attendees from all community
college, CSU and UC chemistry faculty where articulation,
pedagogy, and other academic issues are discussed. Perhaps
IMPAC can help to export this idea to other areas of the state.
There was extensive discussion of means to increase the level
of competency of students entering general chemistry. Use
of a screening diagnostic test is widespread.
Articulation among the institutions seems to be working well
for general chemistry. There are some anomalies regarding
equivalency of organic chemistry courses. Examples of UC campuses
accepting equivalency of a course while a CSU campus denies
it, and an UC campus requiring passing at the 75th percentile
on the ACS final exam were reported. IMPAC may be in a position
to provide a network of contacts for instances when outright
denial of equivalency is an outcome of course articulation
review. Instructor to instructor contact may clarify ambiguities
in documentation of course articulation agreements.
The rising role of distance learning has not yet presented
itself in articulation issues for chemistry major courses,
but this moving target may add complexity to articulation
in the near future.
Afternoon cross-discipline discussions with nutrition and
nursing were held. The discussion with nutrition centered
upon identifying suitable chemistry courses for prerequisites
to enable community colleges to teach courses in nutrition
that would transfer as equivalent to courses at 4-year institutions,
offered typically in the sophomore year, that have a chemistry
prerequisite. The course commonly taught at community colleges
that have a semester of general chemistry followed by a semester
of organic and biochemistry was suggested as a suitable prerequisite.
The major concern regarding chemistry from the nursing instructors
was how to get chemistry into their curriculum for the ADN
while staying under the total unit cap imposed by the National
League of Nursing. Some alternatives discussed were: 1)Removing
some GE requirements for the nursing curriculum such as possibly
creating a new degree of Associate in Nursing rather than
Associate in Science in Nursing. The new offering might avoid
the necessity of meeting some of the GE requirements presently
being imposed. 2)Moving some required clinical work outside
the boundary of the degree as part of a "residency program".
This alternative did not seem practicable to the nursing instructors.
Other discussion paired the issue of the ever-expanding demands
of new knowledge being required for professional competence
in many technical areas and the increasing inconsistency of
that increase with a two-year/four-year curriculum.
Concern regarding a broader articulation with proprietary
private institutions such as National University of Phoenix
University was also expressed, as increasing numbers of community
college students transfer to them. As these private institutions
have expressed little concern about articulation issues with
the community colleges, some of the rewards for community
college preparation of students for transfer vanish when the
transfer is to such institutions.
From the Bay and North Regional Meeting
The chemistry session began with a statement that to make
a smooth transition to a four-year institution, students making
normal progress towards transfer in the chemistry major should
complete the following coursework
- 1 year general chemistry
- 1 ½ years Calculus
- Linear Algebra and Differential Equations
- 1 year organic chemistry
- A physics with calculus course
- 1 semester of quantitative analysis or equivalent
Often transfer students divert their attention to completing
GE requirements. To the extent that completion of GE requirements
takes time away from their completion of the above central
major material, they may wish to consider carefully the point
at which they focus on general education requirements.
A lengthy discussion of the importance of quality instruction
in the organic chemistry course ensued. A number of four-year
campuses expressed reservations about the laboratory-readiness
of their community college transfer students. The importance
of good instrumental exposure, instruction, and experience
is paramount. Participants expressed a divergence of opinion
regarding the importance of hands-on experience of NMR: some
believed that the hands-on experience could not be replaced
by instruction via simulations, while others believed a firm
grasp of the underlying theory of
NMR was more important for long-term success. All agreed,
however, that instrumental experience is important for chemistry
students who must convert textbook exercises into practical
working abilities. Significantly, the community college faculty
indicated that local financial resources were often stretched
to their limits by the demands of instrumentation purchase
and maintenance, as well as the hiring of full time Ph. D.
chemists. From these discussions, two requests emerged: ·
- Some community college faculty expressed a desire to have
the four-year faculty identify two levels of instrumentation
experience: the absolutely required vs. the ideal exposure.
- Faculty at four-year institutions, on the other hand,
expressed a desire for more information to be provided in
course articulation requests. Particularly helpful would
be to include indications of course expectations such as
old exams, course syllabi, and laboratory experiment descriptions.
Fostering a network of known contacts to transmit this information
among the practicing professionals involved in the course
creation and the course articulation approval process can
help enormously in resolving ambiguities in submitted information.
One of the important outcomes of IMPAC is the generation of
these networks.
Another point of concern among both community college faculty
and four-year institution faculty was a worry about a disparity
of standards across institutions. Community college faculty
indicated worries about enrollments shifting between community
colleges in the same area if one campus offers a course that
is perceived by students as being easy, while another adheres
to rigorous instruction. From the perspective of the four-year
campuses, courses that have similar descriptions from different
institutions produce significantly different student backgrounds.
During afternoon discussions with the nursing faculty, they
expressed a desire for a one-semester course that would cover
the essentials of general chemistry, organic chemistry, and
biochemistry as related to the practice of nursing. This course
was of particular interest for the Associate Degree in Nursing
programs where unit caps on the program force the faculty
to make very hard decisions about material to include/omit
from the program. A one-semester course in the essentials
of chemistry for nursing would be a major step in producing
better nurses for the new millennium. Two institutions in
attendance indicated they were cooperating with their local
nursing programs to meet these needs. San Francisco City College
has a draft course outline prepared for precisely this purpose.
CSU Chico is developing a course to be delivered by distance
learning methods to provide outlying nursing students fundamental
instruction in chemistry. The merits of these two programs
need to be monitored for possible extension to other campuses
of higher education in California.
From the Los Angeles Metropolitan Area
Meeting
During the chemistry breakout session, two major topics regarding
articulation difficulties for students between community college
and four-year institutions were discussed. These were: 1)
difficulties students encounter after transfer if they have
not appropriately prepared themselves for the major; and 2)
the continuing ambiguous placement of organic chemistry within
the upper or lower divisions and the consequences for transferring
students.
Some transfer students choose to focus on breadth requirements
at the community college and delay the basic core courses
of general chemistry, organic chemistry and mathematics; this
strategy may have educational benefits while still being detrimental
to student progress. In a highly pyramidal curriculum like
chemistry, students who have not completed the basic chemistry,
math and physics courses in timely fashion during their lower
division study find themselves necessarily stretching their
time to graduation by a minimum of an extra year. UC Irvine
has instituted a policy that students may not transfer to
the campus as a chemistry major without having at least completed
general chemistry and one year of calculus. Community college
instructors indicated that their counselors may lack information
regarding the importance of completing the basic science and
math courses before students transfer to the four-year institutions.
They encouraged the incorporation of such advice in flyers
or letters sent to community college counselors.
The issue of whether organic chemistry is an upper division
or a lower division course and what strictures are placed
on articulation for that course for community college students
was discussed at considerable length. The following represents
the range of responses: Some institutions
- partially accept community college organic chemistry courses,
requiring students to complete additional courses in organic
chemistry.
- accept the equivalency of the community college course
only if the student scores successfully on a standardized
organic chemistry test, such as is available from the ACS
chemical education division.
- offer their organic chemistry as an upper division course.
Community college students perceive a disadvantage in taking
the community college course for which they will not receive
upper division credit, particularly when they will be obliged
to complete specific numbers of upper division units as a
requirement for the degree at their transferring institution.
This latter concern about the required upper division units
after transfer was strongly rebuffed by those attendees from
the four-year institutions that accept the equivalence of
the community college course. They pointed out that there
are ample numbers of upper division requirements that a transfer
student must yet take and that, at least for the typical BS
degree, those specific chemistry requirements along with any
remaining upper division breadth requirement are sufficient
to meet the degree requirements for upper division credit
without any additional work. Community college attendees again
expressed interest in having a letter from the four-year institutions
directed to the chemistry chairs and to the academic counselors
at the community colleges that would explicitly point out
the ease with which the upper division unit requirement for
the degree is met. The students' grapevine convinces them
that it is "better" to take organic chemistry after
transfer than before, and this grapevine information may be
limiting enrollment in community college organic chemistry
courses to the point where the courses are not offered for
lack of sufficient enrollment. Absent a universal agreement
on the treatment of articulation of the organic chemistry
courses, it would be useful to try to develop a small number
of standards out of the existing treatments and to identify
which institutions fall under which standard.
The suggestion that CSU campuses develop a plan for articulation
of organic chemistry across their statewide system arose.
Since there are more intercampus transfers within the CSU
system than generally within UC, there would be greater interest
in developing a general articulation plan. Once the CSU system
had established a norm for transfers within itself, that norm
might serve to move both the community colleges and UC to
move toward its acceptance.
Chemistry met with nursing faculty after lunch. The chemistry
group was interested in hearing what the nursing profession
wanted for a chemistry course. The chemistry requirements
for nursing programs vary widely across the state. Some require
no chemistry, others require courses involving general chemistry,
organic chemistry, and biochemistry. The nursing instructors
indicated that their programs are under increasing pressure
to include more specialized topics, and that they believe
that better preparation in chemistry is desired for their
students, but that the community college programs do not have
sufficient units available to accommodate two semesters of
a five-unit course. They are very interested in working with
chemistry instructors to develop a one semester five-unit
course that would include components of general chemistry,
organic chemistry, and biochemistry of importance to nursing.
From the Central Area Regional Meeting
Once again, the difficulties of smaller community colleges
to purchase and maintain the expensive instrumentation and
to hire appropriate faculty needed for modern organic chemistry
arose. The biology curriculum at Oxnard Community College
has recently added one-semester organic chemistry course;
however, their administrators were concerned that requiring
only one semester of the year-long course would lead to insufficient
enrollment during the second semester. Subsequently, they
withdrew their support for the one-semester course.
The UCSB community college outreach program promotes awareness
that science majors should complete the lower division courses
required for the
prior to transfer. The outreach officials are meeting on
a regular basis with counseling officers at community colleges
and are explaining this preference to them. All UC and CSU
outreach efforts should be encouraged to reinforce this message
to ensure satisfactory progress by transferring students.
Changes in the structure of the academic year and the resulting
impact on instructional modes were discussed. For example,
for laboratory instruction, fifteen 3-hour blocks are more
efficient than the equivalent amount of time presented by
twelve 3-hour-45-minute blocks. As local administrations experiment
with innovative instructional time frames, these aspects must
be recognized.
Cuesta College employs distance learning to meet the needs
of students whose schedules cannot readily accommodate conventional
lecture times. The Archipelago program is used as a web and
media based replacement of the lectures. The software is flexible
enough to insert local requests for electronic interaction
with the instructor of the course. This provides a mechanism
to ensure steady student progress. The students complete the
laboratory portion of the course in conventional laboratory
sections.
In cross-disciplinary discussions, both nutrition and nursing
faculty expressed an interest in an integrated one-semester
course including general chemistry, organic chemistry and
biochemistry. The Associate Degree in Nursing (ADN) programs
are under severe pressure to accomplish their curriculum under
mandated unit caps, but believe their students need a good
course in portions of chemistry relevant to nursing. A dilemma
facing smaller community colleges is the budgetary restrictions
of offering multiply targeted chemistry courses, each with
low enrollments. If a steady enrollment of about twenty or
twenty-five students can be assured, then a targeted course
can be developed. San Francisco City College has developed
a course that appears very attractive to the community college
nursing curriculum. A drawback for students taking a one-semester
course for an ADN program, however, will be that should they
choose to transfer to a four-year program that requires a
two-semester course, they will be confronted with an articulation
problem requiring additional, perhaps repetitive work. At
those community colleges where enrollment can justify such
a specialized chemistry for nursing course, the chemistry
faculty and nursing faculty need to begin dialogue to define
the parameters and content for the course.
The discussion with earth sciences faculty centered on the
importance of the including descriptive inorganic chemistry
in the general chemistry course. Chemistry curricula have
been emphasizing atomic structure and molecular bonding, but
for earth science applications, some more pragmatic material
is especially important. Included would be:
- topics of societal importance and economic significance
of compounds,
- the origin of compounds from their ores and the processing
of required to render them,
- mineralogy and solid phase crystallography,
- silicate chemistry, and
- rudiments of radiochemistry as applied to estimates of
mineral ages.
The chemistry faculty assured the earth science faculty that
these topics are addressed in general chemistry, that the
depth of treatment of any one of them is, of course, variable
among institutions, but that chemistry faculty are sensitized
to the need for inclusion of practical, macroscopic level,
descriptive chemistry as well as the abstract, molecular composition
of matter.
Recommendations for the Discipline
1. Initiate a project to establish categorically the courses
to which community College courses must articulate on each
of the four-year campuses. This project should solicit revised
descriptors for CAN courses that the receiving institution
would be prepared to accept as a description of a course articulating
with their courses. The meetings this year have been conducted
with circulation of a grid of courses believed to be the target
courses for articulation at each of the 4-year campuses in
California, but many technical errors were identified in these
grids during the course of the meetings. Further, the premise
of the grid was articulation to the B.S. major curriculum.
That premise is, however, too narrow to address all the articulation
issues. A minimum of three grids is required, because many
of the articulation issues involve students who transfer with
majors other than chemistry. The grids for B.S. major in chemistry,
A.B. major in chemistry, and B.S. major in biochemistry should
be collected, along with suggested CAN descriptors for courses
that receiving institutions would accept for articulation
to their courses. The present CAN descriptors may be used
as suggested starting points campuses comment. Specific information
regarding how the campus handles articulation of transfer
students offering a community college course in organic chemistry
should also be solicited. This project would provide information
for recommendations 2 below.
2. Develop a limited number of typical models for treatment
of articulation of organic chemistry courses. With the aid
of the information provided from the receiving campuses, it
should be possible to formulate these models. Subsequent identification
of which campuses adhere to which models and dissemination
of that information to community college faculty can greatly
resolve the ambiguities and uncertainties that cause much
of the anxiety for transferring students regarding the articulation
of their organic chemistry courses.
3. Monitor the success of chemistry for nurses courses now
offered at City College of San Francisco (and being readied
by Chico) for possible implementation on other campuses.
4. Consider identifying a number of standards regarding the
transferability of organic chemistry and identify which institutions
fall under which standard.
5. Explore the possibility that CSU campuses would develop
a system-wide plan for articulation of organic chemistry for
presentation and discussion with other segmental faculty within
IMPAC
6. Use the good offices of IMPAC to achieve the following:
- assisting local campus chemistry and nursing faculty in
their efforts to develop courses that will serve their students
needs;
- expanding or supporting current regional discussions among
chemistry fashion as is currently done in the San Diego
area.
Topics for Further Discussion
Resolution of the articulation problems of the organic chemistry
course will take some time. Continued discussions of this
point are essential. Development of the course for nurses
will also remain a discussion point. While the chemistry faculty
have taken the approach that only articulation of complete
course sequences should be attempted by students, the lead
taken by physics and biology to identify units of instruction
that need to be included should be examined for its potential
applicability to general chemistry and organic chemistry.
Perhaps some preliminary discussion regarding distance-learning
courses and how to deal with laboratory in that context may
be broached.
Recommendations Forwarded/to be Forwarded
to:
CAN: Explore the possibility
of a revision of the CAN process, that might attract UC's
participation in CAN. Revision of the chemistry course descriptors
compiled from recommendation 1 above might achieve broader
consensus as an articulation vehicle. Further revision of
the CAN process might require each course seeking identification
with a CAN number to be subject to examination and certification
of course content quality by a faculty review committee containing
representatives of all three segments of higher education
in California. This quality certification by a faculty committee
would carry significant weight in individual articulation
agreements. Eventually, as confidence in the CAN process grew,
CAN certification might begin to serve as a central articulation
review, strongly reducing or possibly replacing the present
need for multiple binary agreements. The existence of the
IMPAC project and its continued funding may make this a propitious
time to initiate these changes, as resources may be available
to establish this revision. Such a possible revision of procedure
might be shared with CIAC to explore whether UC would be willing
to reconsider its participation in CAN if revised.
CIAC: If CAN is prepared to consider a revised procedure involving
joint faculty review of course quality, would it become a
vehicle by which the three segments can pursue simplified
articulation procedures? Consider its possible impact on existing
mechanisms of articulation. Would it interfere with present
procedures for reaching articulation agreements? Could it
complement and/or assist present procedures?
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