The broad mission of educators in the Physical Sciences is to share a dynamic method of inquiry that has been trained over centuries via an iterative process of observation, modeling, prediction, experimentation and observation of the fundamental constituents of the observable universe. Although it can be argued that this tradition is as old as humanity itself, its fruits have never been more impactful to our day-to-day lives than now; both directly in the form of increasingly accelerated technological advancement, and indirectly by serving as a kind of method testing-ground for modeling systems outside of the traditional physical sciences. The broad purpose of the Community College system is to provide a mechanism to enable people to enter the workforce with specific skills required for particular types of jobs and/or to prepare people to continue on to more education and training before entering the workforce. At Butte College specifically, our mission is to provide quality education, services and workforce training to students who aspire to become productive members of a diverse, sustainable and global society. Melding these two imperative missions in a meaningful way that can be used to contextualize our plans for the future requires a split mission: Our mission for STEM career track and non-STEM career track pathways. For the STEM skills career track student (~80% of PS FTES): It is the mission of the Butte College Physical Sciences department to provide students with: a robust and program-informed schedule that allows for published pathways that we serve to be completable by a dedicated student within advertised timelines, and a maximally-inclusive and high-quality educational experience in the physical sciences dedicated to increasing the access of STEM fields to people with diverse ways of thinking and various backgrounds under the operating assumption that science is a reflection of humanity’s understanding of the cosmos not a reflection of the cosmos itself. We will know that we are successful when we have determined that all students have been afforded the achievable opportunity to take their next steps with confidence. For the GE students seeking non-STEM career tracks (~20% of PS FTES): The Butte College Physical Science department will provide our General Education students with a mindful and welcoming effort to match their changing interests and behaviors with experiences that highlight the processes, products and power of the culture of the Physical Sciences and how they will continue to play a central role in creating a sustainable future for humanity.
Overview:
The Department of Physical Sciences enjoys an excellent reputation within the campus community. The Chemistry, Geology, and Physics programs offer lower-division courses for science and engineering majors as well as preparatory courses for the nursing and respiratory therapy career programs and the Physical Science program offers general education courses for all majors. Students that have been through our programs return on a regular basis to reflect on their experiences, and the sense of collegiality they felt while in our classes. This is also reflected in student evaluations. Full-time faculty members Colin Ferguson, Penny Lillie, Jason Trento, and Bob White are former Butte College students and decided to return to the department and give back some of what they received. We work with other departments (specifically Mathematics, Biology, and Computer Science) to create a student-friendly schedule with accessible offerings in a number of different formats. Most sections in all four programs tend to close before the end of registration, many with full wait lists, reflecting a high degree of demand for our programs as well as a solid reputation for our courses.
Outside of the classroom our department is involved in a number of project/activities that serve our mission.
We work closely with Butte College’s Supplemental Instruction (SI) Program which is run with love and skill by April Hennessy and facilitated by our students to provide a community of learning around our more challenging “gateway” courses. Every semester ~4 of our instructors participate in this program. In addition to the obvious benefit of the students that use SI the training and experiences that the facilitators get often helps them get into world-renowned institutions as they move on to their educational goals.
Elizabeth Wannenmacher, Michael Panunto and our colleague from the Mathematics Department, Tierra Lloyd serve as faculty advisors for the Science and Math Club. With regular and awe inducing contributions of demonstrations and technical presentations from our Chemistry Stockroom Magician Dave Carr and periodic tours of local science-based businesses among other typical club social events the Science and Math Club offers a no-stakes opportunity to create community around a common interest.
Michael Panunto, Kristin Milinkevich, Michael Lodewyk, Bob White, Martin Wallace and Tiffani Anderson have participated in one, the other or both Week Zero and the Science Connection Institute. These efforts to meet the needs of our students as they enter into college STEM pathways involved multiple departments outside of Physical Science including our active MESA program and the Biology and Engineering and Computer Science Departments.
Delving in deeper into the details of the Physical Sciences Department (~ 6% of total college FTES):
Chemistry (57% FTES of PS Department 3.4% of campus):
Recent increased Chemistry offerings were achieved through expanding two sections of Chem 110 into the evening and restructuring some Chem 51 curricular details to use lab space more efficiently enabled us to expand our Chem 51 offerings as well. These have resulted in a year over year increase of FTES of 8% (from 285 to 308). These increases have us beyond what is reasonably sustainable with our space, instructional and technical support constraints. Still, operating at full capacity, we continue to turn away students that would support an estimated two additional sections of Chem 51 and two additional sections of Chem 1. Our Chemistry faculty have agreed on restructuring the curriculum in Chem 1 for pedagogical reasons which will have the added benefit of expanding our available wet-lab space. Requests and administrative approval for an additional full time tenure track instructor will cover this increased demand and hopefully we will see the end of waitlists in core program courses. Recent approval of a construction bond by Butte County voters will fund a much-needed new science building to open around 2027. If we continue to have waitlists in our core program offerings as we strategically build out, we will have a more reasonable assessment of demand as we begin plans for a new science building which can impact decades into the future.
In the meantime, as we try to find the limit of the demand for our courses we will continue to explore opportunities to expand the space in which we can offer courses and house instructor offices (a combination of portable lecture spaces and converting our PS108 room into laboratory space), to begin placing sections of certain classes (i.e., those without labs) in other buildings if space becomes available, and to study the feasibility of offering sections of more classes at night or on weekends. The Chemistry program has two important needs: more space for continued expansion of the schedule; and more money for equipment and supplies. The money increases we are asking for need to cover increased costs of chemicals, an increased need for student graders and assistants, and a need to begin purchasing equipment that will not be used immediately but will, instead, be held for the new building.
Physics (17% FTES of PS Department 1% of campus):
Enrollment in the physics program continues to increase; most of the physics classes fill every semester along with full wait lists as we continue to add sections to the schedule. Previous research of similar community colleges in California has shown that we are below average in our offerings of the algebra-based (PHYS 21 and 22) physics sequence and the third semester of the calculus-based (PHYS 43) sequence. We have recently hired a fourth physicist which has allowed us to offer all three of these classes during both semesters (in addition to the summer session for 21 and 22). The first time we offered PHYS 21 in the spring we enrolled 8 students over cap. The PHYS 43 course has shown an approximately 1.5 section fill rate over the course of the year which is a 50% increase over what we were supporting before. All told like Chemistry, Physics has produced an increase in FTES of 8%. The physics program currently subsists on two lab rooms that it shares with the geology and physical science programs. Therefore, like chemistry, we will need to continue improving scheduling efficiency and to look at non-traditional scheduling modalities to increase student access. In addition, we anticipate ever increasing supply and equipment budgets to begin stocking up for the new science building.
Geology (6% FTES of PS Department):
The geology program is quite strong considering we only have a single full-time instructor. We have a full schedule of Physical Geology (GEOL 32) and we continue to offer Historical Geology (GEOL 34) each Fall. We added a FA/SP Earth Science with Lab (PSC 11) at the request of counseling and the Child and Family Development Department as part of an early education AS-T that filled at its first offering and is currently being taught by a part-time instructor. The program's greatest needs are a commitment from administration--in light of the recently approved AS-T degree and Geology and added demand for Geologists in service to other departments--to offer more sections and hire a full-time instructor sometime in the near future.
Physical Science (20% FTES of PS Department 1% of campus) :
Enrollments in the Physical Science program are very good--most classes fill well before the semester begins. The Weather classes (PSC 50 and 51) are very strong at both the Chico Center and the Main Campus. We finally added a new course, Natural Hazards (PSC 53), in Summer 2015. It was successful and is now being offered regularly each Fall semester. Environmental Science (PSC 10) continues to be extremely popular. We currently offer one section of 24 students that closes during the first week of registration. The interdisciplinary Introductory Physical Science (PSC 20 and 21) also has had very good enrollments but AS-T requirements have seen the introduction of two courses: Concepts in Physical Science (PSC 12) and Earth Science with Lab (PSC 11). Due to content overlap with PSC 20/21, this addition has caused a shift in offerings. As we are adding FA/SP sections of PSC 12 and PSC 11 we are reducing the offerings of PSC 20 and 21 (Reduced PSC 21 from 2 to 1 section in SP 18). Still, we lost one section and gained two lec/labs worth so we are still growing. To meet the need of the lecture-only physical science course offering, the physicists have created a lecture-only version of the Introductory Astronomy course (PSC 30) called A Survey of the Universe (PSC 27). The goal is to meet the demand of the lecture-only physical science course previously met by PSC 20 with a popular offering that does not have the intimidating mathematical demands of the lab portion of PSC 30 and 30H and can also be offered in the online modality.
Finally, our Physical Science Senior Laboratory Technician currently works under a ten-month contract. This position is responsible for three of our four programs; lacking the summer work time makes it very difficult for the tech to handle long-term projects. The physics and physical science faculty have had to forgo several building projects because of this. The increasing number of sections in both physical science and physics will only increase the tech's workload and the continued packing will reduce the time allowed for changes between labs which changes the nature of the work making it more stressful. We feel the tech can be much more effective if the position is recharacterized as a twelve-month one.
Two primary measures compared in the figure above disaggregated for the Physical Sciences, Biology, Mathematics and English and shown against the main campus averages. Our retention rates compare favorably with campus averages and our success rates are below the campus average (like all of LAMS) but considering this set of departments has numerous “gatekeeper” courses (which is why we have the bulk of participants in the Supplemental Instruction program) we would assess our performance as a department is admirable though not completely absent of opportunities to improve.
Our latest program review was 2013-14. The Validation Team issued twelve (12) recommendations. Their status is outlined below.
New science building: The college has recently agreed to float a bond issue which was passed by Butte County voters, part of this bond will fund a new science building.
Counseling: The department works closely with two counselors, Debbie Reynolds and John Soldate, so that the advice they give science students is germane to their majors and helps them navigate our courses efficiently and successfully.
Fees: We used to collect profits from the sale of lab manuals, but the college rescinded this ability four years ago. The Validation team recommended that if the administration does not allow us to reinstate these profits, then they should make up the difference in our supply budgets. Recent policy changes by administration have enabled us to resume adding a small mark-up to our lab manuals provided we offer free online versions to students. We shall continue to report on the impacts of these policy improvements.
Long-term savings: With the resumed source on ongoing augmentations from the sales of the lab manuals which should provide an aspect of our budget that will scale with the amount of use of our materials we can create a plan to save for critical equipment failure. Its difficult to plan for that at this time since our department has yet to normalize. We will know more next year.
Hire an additional chemist: Due to a failed hire and intense demand we currently have 2 Full-time Temporary Chemists. We are in process of hiring 3 tenure track Chemists: 2 to replace the Full-Time Temp positions and a third to meet persistent demand. With an overall increase in FTES of 8% from 2016 to 2017 this will allow us to increase our student access further to meet still apparently latent demand.
Smart room upgrades: With the reality that our new building is approximately a decade away, we are requesting Smart-room upgrades to bring us up to the institutional norm of classroom technology.
Prerequisite enforcement: Done.
Improved scheduling using all five days: This is something we have no control over. The faculty at large have convinced themselves that by only meeting their students four days per week instead of five somehow improves student success and access.
Tracking graduates: In progress. This will be closer to completion as the campus shifts from course to program thinking.
Chemical Hygiene Officer stipend: Done
Projects involving students: In our engineering physics series we have been implementing two project based aspects of the curriculum: In Physics 41 the students have a semester project called the Group Goldberg machine. It is an extended Rube Goldberg Machine that the whole class participates in. In Fall 17 the Group Goldberg machine was triggered in the basement level of the library and it was a public success. In Physics 42 students have an individual “motor challenge” where students construct an electric motor out of a specified set of materials then get points for speed of rotation. Both of these projects are well liked by the students, provide a opportunity for community outside normal curriculum and it is a low risk way to get experience with the frustrating and fulfilling process of creation moderated by the real constraints of nature …not arbitrary human assessment.
2+2 articulation agreements for CHEM 110: This idea has not been pursued yet. Following this recommendation the faculty first focused on possible changes in CHEM 110 content due to a request from the Life Sciences department and now we are developing a replacement for CHEM 110 that is transferable to make both the feeder programs happy and give students options for unit progress toward degrees with every class they take. Once this issue is resolved, we will pursue 2 + 2 agreements or, more likely dual enrollment opportunities.
Our latest program review was 2013-14. The Validation Team issued twelve (12) recommendations. Their status is outlined below.
New science building: The college has recently agreed to float a bond issue which was passed by Butte County voters, part of this bond will fund a new science building.
Counseling: The department works closely with two counselors, Debbie Reynolds and John Soldate, so that the advice they give science students is germane to their majors and helps them navigate our courses efficiently and successfully.
Fees: We used to collect profits from the sale of lab manuals, but the college rescinded this ability four years ago. The Validation team recommended that if the administration does not allow us to reinstate these profits, then they should make up the difference in our supply budgets. Recent policy changes by administration have enabled us to resume adding a small mark-up to our lab manuals provided we offer free online versions to students. We shall continue to report on the impacts of these policy improvements.
Long-term savings: With the resumed source on ongoing augmentations from the sales of the lab manuals which should provide an aspect of our budget that will scale with the amount of use of our materials we can create a plan to save for critical equipment failure. Its difficult to plan for that at this time since our department has yet to normalize. We will know more next year.
Hire an additional chemist: Due to a failed hire and intense demand we currently have 2 Full-time Temporary Chemists. We are in process of hiring 3 tenure track Chemists: 2 to replace the Full-Time Temp positions and a third to meet persistent demand. With an overall increase in FTES of 8% from 2016 to 2017 this will allow us to increase our student access further to meet still apparently latent demand.
Smart room upgrades: With the reality that our new building is approximately a decade away, we are requesting Smart-room upgrades to bring us up to the institutional norm of classroom technology.
Prerequisite enforcement: Done.
Improved scheduling using all five days: This is something we have no control over. The faculty at large have convinced themselves that by only meeting their students four days per week instead of five somehow improves student success and access.
Tracking graduates: In progress. This will be closer to completion as the campus shifts from course to program thinking.
Chemical Hygiene Officer stipend: Done
Projects involving students: In our engineering physics series we have been implementing two project based aspects of the curriculum: In Physics 41 the students have a semester project called the Group Goldberg machine. It is an extended Rube Goldberg Machine that the whole class participates in. In Fall 17 the Group Goldberg machine was triggered in the basement level of the library and it was a public success. In Physics 42 students have an individual “motor challenge” where students construct an electric motor out of a specified set of materials then get points for speed of rotation. Both of these projects are well liked by the students, provide a opportunity for community outside normal curriculum and it is a low risk way to get experience with the frustrating and fulfilling process of creation moderated by the real constraints of nature …not arbitrary human assessment.
2+2 articulation agreements for CHEM 110: This idea has not been pursued yet. Following this recommendation the faculty first focused on possible changes in CHEM 110 content due to a request from the Life Sciences department and now we are developing a replacement for CHEM 110 that is transferable to make both the feeder programs happy and give students options for unit progress toward degrees with every class they take. Once this issue is resolved, we will pursue 2 + 2 agreements or, more likely dual enrollment opportunities.
Strategy 1 - Increased Lecture & Laboratory Space
All four programs share the same basic needs: one, the ability to add sections of high-demand classes to the schedule, both at Chico Center and Main Campus; two, more lecture, laboratory and office space; three, more funds for both supplies (to account for inflation, depreciation, and attrition) and student assistants; and, four, more staff that scale with our growth which has been finally allowed and supported by administration. The recently approved 2016 bond measure will solve the space issues (and staff issues) long-term, but we need to think about short-term solutions. We see a coherent plan to achieve this. We require both lab and lecture space. We can investigate innovative but locally untested strategies to employ hybrid online methodologies to open up some of the lecture space (like offering 1/3 of the lecture time online) but lab space is the limiting constraint since we, as a department, will not sanction any online lab offerings attached to our reputation as a department. The options for lab space are portable labs or converting PS 108 into a lab space. In the short term as we investigate the possibility of hybrid methodologies portable lecture space would be advised and necessary if PS 108 was retooled for lab during any instruction time.
To unpack this request consider the following realities. Recent shifts in curricular structure have opened up lab space to add three new sections of our severely impacted CHEM 1 offerings. This moved chemistry dry lab activities into a lecture room. With this releasing shift, our lab space is occupied 80% of MTWThF from 8-5pm. For lab space that needs prep time for potentially hazardous substances requiring safety considerations beyond what would be expected in the lecture setting 80% is beyond capacity. If you consider the potential downstream growth that will result from our increased offerings in CHEM 1 (namely adding sections to CHEM 2 and ultimately CHEM 21), We can currently consider our chemistry lab space overbooked for the behavior of the students we serve. We still see latent need that would support at least two new sections of CHEM 51, so we are still capable of growth, but the box is not big enough. We also have been offering night classes which fill for CHEM 110 but our primary course offerings will require comprehensive programatic scheduling to reliably fill in the nighttime slots. As for Physics, Physical Science and Geology our lab space is 93% full five days a week from 9-5pm. This reality is static and largely immovable.
We are running out of reliable options for expanding to meet the needs of our students in primary program pathways serving numerous programs within and outside our department. Which, by the way, also bring in GE FTES. Our stem students are alpha consumers of college with impressive career options and the opportunity for significant social mobility. Not often are you faced with win-win propositions as clean as what would result from expansion of our STEM programs in general which are anchored in Math and Natural Sciences. We believe it is urgent to act now for the sake of the next decades to find the end of the student demand for our classes so that we may reliably assess the needs of the building we are going to start planning. We cannot find this latent demand until we don’t have wait lists and we can’t do this without a concerted institutional effort to give space for us to expand and the patience to let the students fill into our new expanded state.
Since the bond will most likely go to infrastructure and not to equipment and consumables, we also need to start increasing our equipment and supply budgets--slowly, but regularly--so as to begin purchasing equipment over the next seven years that can be stored and moved into the new building.
All four programs share the same basic needs: one, the ability to add sections of high-demand classes to the schedule, both at Chico Center and Main Campus; two, more lecture, laboratory and office space; three, more funds for both supplies (to account for inflation, depreciation, and attrition) and student assistants; and, four, more staff that scale with our growth which has been finally allowed and supported by administration. The recently approved 2016 bond measure will solve the space issues (and staff issues) long-term, but we need to think about short-term solutions. We see a coherent plan to achieve this. We require both lab and lecture space. We can investigate innovative but locally untested strategies to employ hybrid online methodologies to open up some of the lecture space (like offering 1/3 of the lecture time online) but lab space is the limiting constraint since we, as a department, will not sanction any online lab offerings attached to our reputation as a department. The options for lab space are portable labs or converting PS 108 into a lab space. In the short term as we investigate the possibility of hybrid methodologies portable lecture space would be advised and necessary if PS 108 was retooled for lab during any instruction time.
To unpack this request consider the following realities. Recent shifts in curricular structure have opened up lab space to add three new sections of our severely impacted CHEM 1 offerings. This moved chemistry dry lab activities into a lecture room. With this releasing shift, our lab space is occupied 80% of MTWThF from 8-5pm. For lab space that needs prep time for potentially hazardous substances requiring safety considerations beyond what would be expected in the lecture setting 80% is beyond capacity. If you consider the potential downstream growth that will result from our increased offerings in CHEM 1 (namely adding sections to CHEM 2 and ultimately CHEM 21), We can currently consider our chemistry lab space overbooked for the behavior of the students we serve. We still see latent need that would support at least two new sections of CHEM 51, so we are still capable of growth, but the box is not big enough. We also have been offering night classes which fill for CHEM 110 but our primary course offerings will require comprehensive programatic scheduling to reliably fill in the nighttime slots. As for Physics, Physical Science and Geology our lab space is 93% full five days a week from 9-5pm. This reality is static and largely immovable.
We are running out of reliable options for expanding to meet the needs of our students in primary program pathways serving numerous programs within and outside our department. Which, by the way, also bring in GE FTES. Our stem students are alpha consumers of college with impressive career options and the opportunity for significant social mobility. Not often are you faced with win-win propositions as clean as what would result from expansion of our STEM programs in general which are anchored in Math and Natural Sciences. We believe it is urgent to act now for the sake of the next decades to find the end of the student demand for our classes so that we may reliably assess the needs of the building we are going to start planning. We cannot find this latent demand until we don’t have wait lists and we can’t do this without a concerted institutional effort to give space for us to expand and the patience to let the students fill into our new expanded state.
Since the bond will most likely go to infrastructure and not to equipment and consumables, we also need to start increasing our equipment and supply budgets--slowly, but regularly--so as to begin purchasing equipment over the next seven years that can be stored and moved into the new building.
Strategy 2 - Twelve-month Senior Physical Science Laboratory Technician
The senior physical science laboratory technician is currently serving on a ten-month contract. This individual is responsible for the equipment, lab facilities, and supply and grader budgets of three (3) of the four (4) programs in the department: physics, physical science, and geology. A successful senior laboratory technician is one who is orderly, punctual, self-motivating, and knowledgeable in the physical sciences in the broadest sense. Most importantly, however, this position demands someone who enjoys seizing the initiative and working on projects that enhance student success and whose benefits might not accrue for several semesters. As we increase the number of sections, the responsibilities of the senior laboratory technician will inevitably increase as well. When we move into the new science building, this will only become a larger issue. Given our needs now and our anticipated needs in the long-term, we want to recharacterize this position into a twelve-month one.
Increasing demand in physics and the uncertainty surrounding the overall space allocations for the entire department in the near future have greatly added to the senior laboratory technician's normal duties and job stress level. These duties include: maintaining and servicing all the laboratory and demonstration equipment for the three programs; overseeing and dispersing monies from the supply and grader budgets for those programs; summer school support; and, working on various building and laboratory projects that enhance students' experiences, provide safer work environments, and help the department as a whole operate more efficiently. The time available for these routine duties, however, is slowly eroding due to the ever-increasing time the technician must devote to help the physics program grow. The technician's absence from the college for two months each summer exacerbates this problem, making it very difficult for him to accomplish many long-term projects since many of his routine duties are being squeezed into ten months. While the department does have another full-time senior technician, the physical science tech position is unique. Therefore, his duties cannot be readily transferred to someone else.
A bulleted list of duties that currently are NOT being performed at only ten months include:
•end of year inventory of equipment and consumable supplies.
•cleaning and calibrating laboratory equipment.
•pricing and purchasing new laboratory equipment and supplies.
•designing and building new laboratory equipment.
•researching and helping develop new laboratory experiments and demonstrations.
•developing new skills that enhance work: lathe work; chemical safety; soldering; milling; Datatel.
•organizing physics and physical sciences stockroom.
•setting up purchase orders.
Strategy 3 - Equipment
What our department makes the college in terms of FTES due to lab hours is slightly offset by the cost of running labs (though a thorough accounting of the money made by our students after leaving our programs we believe would show a return on investment more than acceptable by taxpayers). We have extensive equipment needs. Some of this is to replace outmoded and/or unserviceable equipment, and some of it is upgrades, and some of it is simply to acquire more units due to more sections of a given class. Finally, we anticipate further needs in the future to equip the new science building. As we have grown, the usage of the equipment we have accelerates and increases the frequency of replacement and maintenance requirements. With recent growth (~8%) we anticipate a commensurate increase in our equipment repair and replacement needs at the very least.
The Physical Sciences only work when students perform experiments. Therefore, specialized equipment and dedicated facilities are key components in every class we teach. Equipment must be maintained and calibrated and we have to continually replenish consumables like chemicals, glassware, carbonized paper, electrical components, testing samples, housekeeping materials, etc. Relentless improvements in technology, along with continual software upgrades, means we constantly need to improve the way we use our equipment, or replace it, or completely change the way we do experiments. All of this requires a large supply budget, a budget that increases over time.
Strategy 4 - Student Grader Money
As we continue to add sections and try to fulfill other tasks for the college (e.g., SLO assessment), it is becoming even more important for us to have sufficient and ongoing funds available for student graders. Recent reinstatement of the ability to gain student funds from small mark-ups of the lab manuals has decreased the long term concern for maintaining the meticulous and proven pedagogy used by the Chemistry instructors but we remain uncertain about where the funding levels will normalize. Consequently, to avoid breaking a working model of evaluation of student work, the Chemistry program needs continued monies to continue with this proven pedagogical choice. Last year the college graciously awarded us more monies toward this cause, but we anticipate our grading needs to continue to increase with the addition of 3 more full-time chemists and this support must continue at least in the short-term.
Mastery of the physical sciences requires focused attention on detail and the nurturing of analytical skills. Hence, grading lab reports and other work is necessary, yet very time-consuming for the instructors especially since many of us are on overload. Employing our successful students as graders yields three great benefits: 1) Students receive significantly more feedback with an increased level of detail and in a more timely manner than the instructor would be able to provide alone. 2) Instructors are better able to focus on student success and learning outcomes in their courses. 3) The student graders receive valuable training in analytical skills and physical intuition, as well as a source of income with a highly flexible schedule.
Strategy 5 - Counseling Connections
Build deeper connections with counseling to allow us to better understand the needs of our students when they are in the program planning stages, learn from past students’ interactions with the processes at our institution to inform processes in the future, and communicate relevant discipline specific knowledge back to counselors. STEM students (~15% of the campus FTES) have special needs that may not be the dominant kind of needs that a general student may have. There are policies and practices that work for the vast majority of students but may not be beneficial for our measly 15%. It seems that a process flow which were capable of identifying the right 15% and advise them accordingly may have a lot of bang for the buck in terms of better matches for programs and behaviors being found for our students at all stages of their adventures with us.
See above.
Strategy 6 - Professional Development Travel Funds for STEM instructors
Technology and scientific advancement as well as advancements in STEM teaching strategies are all in a era of rapid and accelerating change. The nature and global ubiquity of the importance of STEM tends to make the nature of conferences at the cutting edge of the scientific and technological endeavor to be more national in nature than local. When this fact is coupled with generally available funds to all faculty it results in a situation where our STEM instructors are less able to keep skills updated with their fields because to do so would require travel to areas further from home. As our campus culture shifts to design with the end in mind our STEM instructors have to keep abreast of the end more regularly since Science and Technology is changing more rapidly than other transfer fields. STEM instructors need more travel funds to keep even with the campus at large in professional development.
See above.
Strategy 7 - Maker Space
The college is currently studying the creation of a Maker Space on campus where students and faculty can work on various construction and fabrication projects. We fully support this as we see that students mostly learn by doing. A Maker Space gives them just that without it impacting our instructional lab rooms. We hope the administration continues to support this project.
See above.
Lecture and laboratory space. We would like the college to consider remodeling unused space (e.g., automotive) into labs or possibly lecture rooms. Since there is no other appropriate space on main campus for chemistry and physics labs, this seems a sensible solution. If not, then consider moving some labs into temporary portable spaces that could also serve the Life Sciences department until the new science building is finished. Other options include getting portable lecture spaces and converting PS 108 into a Lab Space.
The department currently has NO external funding sources.
| Original Priority | Program, Unit, Area | Resource Type | Account Number | Object Code | One Time Augment | Ongoing Augment |
| Description | Supporting Rationale | Potential Alternative Funding Sources | Prioritization Criteria | |||
| 1 | Chemistry | Operating Expenses | $9,400.00 | $14,500.00 | ||
| Student Grader Money | Graded assignments are at the core of how Chemistry is taught. Students must receive feedback on assignments to correct errors in technique and concepts. Course content builds on previous understanding, so this process of learn, apply, correct, and understand is then applied to additional topics. The College’s support for student grading did not keep pace with increases in enrollment, so faculty began to add a small surcharge to faculty-produced lab manuals (with the blessing of the College’s administration) and used these funds to support the demand for grading. In 2014, this practice was suddenly stopped by the College administration. However, in spite of promises to replace the funding, no permanent solution to the loss of this support has come forward. This has had a significant negative impact on our educational programs, affecting our ability to achieve our Program Student Learning Outcomes. Laboratory reports and homework assignments are two major categories of graded assignments used to support student these SLOs. Laboratory experiments are critical for Chemistry Program SLOs #1 and #2. Students prepare for each experiment by reading the experimental introduction and procedure (including safety warnings). Many classes require that students complete a “pre-lab” that includes sample calculations and concept questions. The students then complete the experiment, and data is then used to determine the experiment’s results, which involves graphing and/or calculations using the data on the report. Finally, students are asked to interpret data, reflect on the experimental procedure, and answer concept questions based on their results (which applies to SLO#3). These reports provide the student important feedback on their understanding of the experiment and its concepts. Homework assignments address SLOs #2 and #3. Students are assigned reading in their text, and then directed to answer questions (in writing) about what they have read. Collecting and grading homework assignments is especially critical in entry-level chemistry classes, since the students may not yet understand the essential nature of hands-on learning in the natural sciences. In November 2015, an affective survey was administered to five different chemistry classes (310 responses) to assess the value of graded assignments to the students in those classes. These courses varied in whether homework was simply assigned (and not collected) or collected and graded and not all courses required pre-lab assignments. The results indicated that feedback is seen as being extremely important to students (80-100% responded this is always or sometimes true), and comments are especially helpful to them (87-94%). Timely feedback is critical to the students (90-100% as very important or important). Homework is also universally seen as essential in preparing for examinations (95-100% as true). Finally, pre-labs and especially graded lab reports are seen as valuable teaching and learning tools (80-97%). Select comments included: • When teachers write comments on my paper it really helps me to see what I have done wrong in the problem. • Having homework being fully graded, rather than only partly graded would be fantastic. It helps hone in on study issues. • It is concerning not to receive corrected assignments in a timely manner because it is hard to compare any progress. It is clear homework and reports that are graded, include comments, and are returned in a timely fashion, are at the core of student success in chemistry courses. It is not physically possible for instructors to fulfill this responsibility without help. A core part of our instructional program, fundamental to achieving student learning outcomes, has been supported by income from our lab manuals that we are no longer collecting. This has forced us to make uncomfortable pedagogical decisions based on this lack of support, and our ability to continue to provide effective instruction has been seriously compromised. |
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| 2 | Chemistry | Facilities | $22,500.00 | $0.00 | ||
| Computers | We are hiring new chemistry instructors who will need new office computers and furniture |
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| 3 | Physics, Physical Science & Geology | Personnel | $11,000.00 | $11,000.00 | ||
| Twelve-month Senior Physical Sciences Laboratory Technician | Our Physical Sciences Senior Lab Technician is currently on a ten-month contract. He is unable to utilize the summer months to work on badly needed long-term projects. We want to recharacterize this position into a twelve-month one. Since we've added sections to the summer schedule and spring schedule and we plan to continue adding, we need to have a full-year technician. While Rusty is very good at juggling his various duties and assignments, he lacks to time to work on long-range projects over the summer. We have a growing list of physics and physical science demonstration equipment that we would like to have Rusty build and test and given the constraints he has during the normal academic year, these assignments can only be realized in a summer setting. |
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| 4 | Physics | Operating Expenses | $0.00 | $4,517.00 | ||
| Increased supply, grader, and equipment budgets | The current Physics budget is $5708 ($2763 for supplies, $2720 for student graders, and $225 for student assistants). The program has NO dedicated equipment budget. We ask for ongoing increases in the supply and student grader budgets of $237 and $280, respectively, and the creation of a dedicated equipment budget of $4000. The increases for supplies and graders reflect increases in the costs of consumables and increases in the minimum wage. Also, as we add sections to the schedule and full-time faculty take on overloads, they need more student graders. The new equipment budget will help us begin purchasing expensive, yet necessary, equipment for the new science building. (Some of this equipment is listed as separate augmentation requests.) Also, current equipment costs are covered by the supply budget or offset by using Foundation money (since we no longer receive profits from the sale of lab manuals, our Foundation accounts inexorably decrease). Examples of new equipment include: optics benches; liquids lab materials; and circuit labs. Finally, more sections means increases in printing costs, which are currently covered by the Chemistry program. |
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| 5 | Geology | Operating Expenses | $0.00 | $1,767.00 | ||
| Increase in annual supply and travel budgets | The current Geology budget is $643 for supplies and $290 for travel. This amount has not changed in at least six years. We seek an ongoing increase of $767 ($357 for supplies and $410 for travel) as well as the creation of a dedicated equipment budget (there currently isn't one) funded at $1000. Maps, scratch pads, glass plates, and other consumables continue to increase in price. The program also wants to slowly purchase microscopes and balances for the new building. We ask for a travel money increase since the field trips are very popular with the students and assessments have shown that they improve student success. |
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| 6 | Physical Science | Operating Expenses | $0.00 | $3,336.00 | ||
| Increased budgets for supplies | Like Geology and Physics, this program has NO dedicated equipment budget. The current budget is $1304 ($824 for supplies, $340 for student graders, and $140 for travel). We seek ongoing increases of $676 for supplies, $660 for student graders, and the creation of an equipment budget funded at $2000. These increases cover the increase of printing and student grader costs as we continue to add sections. The new equipment budget will help us begin purchasing equipment for the new science building. |
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| 7 | Chemistry | Equipment | $900.00 | $3,900.00 | ||
| ChemDraw software | ChemDraw is software that allows for the creation of line-bond structure drawings that represent molecules, ions, chemical reactions, and a variety of other chemical species and processes. It is industry and academic-standard software that is utilized by chemistry instructors for the development of course materials (including handouts, laboratory experiments, and assessment items). It is also utilized by students in several chemistry courses for writing laboratory experiment reports. This software is instrumental in providing for the following course level SLOs: CHEM 2: B, C; CHEM 21: A, B, C; CHEM 22: A, B, C, D; and CHEM 52: A, B. This software was previously funded for many years by the proceeds from selling lab manuals authored by our department, which is no longer allowed by the College. In spite of promises to replace the funding, no permanent solution to the loss of this support has come forward. |
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| 8 | Chemistry/Physics/Physical Science/Geology | Facilities | $60,000.00 | $0.00 | ||
| Smart Classroom Updates | Three Chemistry Lab spaces, One Physical Science Lab, One Physics Lab and One lecture space needs computers, Projectors, Document Cameras and associated setup. |
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| 9 | Chemistry | Equipment | $9,300.00 | $0.00 | ||
| Organic Chemistry Glassware | Organic Chemistry courses have special glassware requirements. We want to secure a dedicated set of glassware for use in CHEM 21 and CHEM 22 without having to worry about the attrition of the general glassware in the other Chemistry classes. This glassware is necessary for students to perform experimental work and supports the following course level SLOs: CHEM 21: D, E; CHEM 22: D, E. |
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| 10 | Chemistry, Geology, Physics, and Physical Science | Equipment | $75,000.00 | $2,000.00 | ||
| Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) | The ability to view microscopic structures enhances the scientific experience for all students. We have identified various useful projects for an the SEM in the following classes in our department as well as in Biology, Nursing, Welding, Art, and Automotive: PHYS 10, 11, 21, 22, 41, 42, 43; PSC 20; GEOL 32, 34; BIOL 1, 2, 11, 12, 13, 15; ENGR 17, 45; NSG24; WLD 20; AUT 9; and ART 86D, |
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