EAGER: The Experience of a Small College, at a Large Scale

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This project, at the University of California-San Diego, will develop a model for computer science classes at large research universities that incorporates lessons from both MOOCs and high-touch classes at small institutions. The project team will use a combination of lecture, tutors, teaching assistants (TAs), flipped classroom, and peer instruction within the large class setting. The goal is to determine if this approach will lead to the benefits of the high-touch small class approach within the large class large institution setting, with concomitant improvement in performance and retention.The project will include the creation of micro-classes within a large single-instructor course. The micro-classes will be facilitated through the involvement of teaching assistants and tutors, while also leveraging prior experience with peer instruction. The large course will be taught by a single lead instructor, while each micro-class will include 15-25 students and have a dedicated teaching assistant and several dedicated undergraduate tutors. Students will be grouped in their micro-classes when they attend the course lectures, and then have smaller discussion sessions within the micro-class grouping. During these discussion sessions, student will work on interactive exercises, challenge problems, and extensions of the material covered in lecture. In addition, students will receive extensive personalized feedback on their assignments, provided by the tutors, much like the feedback typically received by students in small classes at small colleges. Project evaluation will include study of student attitudes, TA and tutor attitudes, student performance on exams, course outcomes such as failure and drop rates, retention of women and underrepresented minority students, and performance in subsequent classes. This project will be funded by the Division of Undergraduate Education through the IUSE program.