The association between student motivation and learning, and changes in motivation across a course, were evaluated for students enrolled in one-semester foundation-level inorganic chemistry courses at multiple postsecondary institutions across the United States. The Academic Motivation Scale for Chemistry (AMS-Chemistry) and the Foundations of…

The paper presents an empirical study on university students' perceptions of nature of science (NOS). NOS is framed in terms of the cognitive, epistemic, and social-institutional systems of science based on the Family Resemblance Approach (FRA) (Erduran and Dagher 2014; Irzik and Nola 2014; Irzik and Nola, SCED 20:591-607, 2011). FRA includes the…

National efforts to reform undergraduate education have highlighted the need to relate abstract concepts in biology to real-world examples, especially for non-majors who may undervalue scientific processes. We therefore decided to introduce a module titled "Climate Change, Sustainable Practices and Plastic Pollution," utilizing such…

The past generation has seen major advances in science and technology, and in the preparation of high school students for college. This study investigates changes in the science knowledge of college students, and in their attitudes and belief systems regarding science and technology. Over 12,600 non-science majors at the University of Arizona were…

Within the context of a transformative learning field experiment, the ethical ideologies of marketing majors, logistics majors, and nonbusiness majors were found to differ. Based on this finding, a field experiment was conducted to determine the effect (if any) that ethics instruction has on marketing and logistics majors versus nonbusiness…

This study investigated the interaction of disciplinary and interdisciplinary learning in a team-taught, first-year, interdisciplinary sustainability course. We surveyed (pre/post) both STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and non-STEM majors (N = 241), assessing attitudes and content knowledge. Responses were analyzed using…

The aspiration of biology education is to give students tools to apply knowledge learned in the classroom to everyday life. Genetic modification is a real-world biological concept that relies on an in-depth understanding of the molecular behavior of DNA and proteins. This study investigated undergraduate biology students' conceptions of…

As part of an effort to improve students' knowledge of constellations and bright stars in an introductory level descriptive astronomy survey course, we measured the baseline knowledge that students bring to the class and how their score evolve over the course of the semester. This baseline is needed by the broader astronomy education research…

Much attention has been given to the opposition toward the teaching of evolution at the K-12 level and the movement to include alternative theories, such as Intelligent Design (ID), in the science curriculum. However, very little is known regarding the attitudes of community college students toward the study of evolution and the inclusion of ID in…

Students' understanding of musical style periods was assessed at Liberty Baptist College. The investigation was prompted by evidence suggesting that non-music majors who complete a music appreciation course understand a broad overview of music history better than music majors who complete music history courses. Compared to the music history…