First Year Seminars have been found to positively impact student experience and retention in universities, especially in large-outcome measures such as grade point average, retention rates, and ultimately, graduation rates. Common learning experiences, a high-impact practice, such as course readings, a syllabus template, and discussion topics help…

This piece reports on an early attempt at gamification (reframing post-secondary classrooms drawing on the structure of games). The attempt began in the 2011-2012 academic year and is structured to allow students substantial autonomy in determining which assignments, and how many of them, to complete over the course of the semester. Initial…

The Monte Carlo Quiz (MCQ), a single-item quiz, is so named because chance, with the roll of a die, determines (a) whether the quiz is administered; (b) the specific article, chapter, or section of the assigned reading that the quiz covers; and (c) the particular question that makes up the quiz. The MCQ encourages both punctual completion and deep…