DRAFT: Program Review Part C

Biology Program

July 2015

The Biology Program has completed Section A, part of Section B, and is now working to finish up Section C of Program Review. Section C requires that we reflect on what we have learned about our program from both Section A and Section B and identify some goals to address areas of concern or challenges in the program with an action plan. While we haven’t completed Section B, we do have enough information from the data analysis to obtain an insight of current trends and begin to evaluate a goal of our program through various assessment projects.

Summary of what we have learned from working on Section A and Section B of Program Review:

Our work on Section A of the Biology Program Review identified that the program serves students interested in transferring to a university, in completing pre-requisite courses for allied health care programs, and in fulfilling requirements for an AA degree.

Section B consisted of two parts, a data analysis of the program and an assessment project designed to evaluate how well the program is meeting the goal of improving student literacy in science.

The data analysis of Section B identified that with the majority of FTEs taught by PTF the program could support the addition of another Full-time tenured faculty. We also identified that while there was a decrease in enrollments from 2011-12 we saw a subsequent increase in online instruction (0.7%) over the same time period. We are curious as to whether the decrease in enrollments is due to more online offerings and less on-campus options for students. We have also noticed a decrease in success rates for both African American and Native American students and are interested in how to reverse this trend and improve success rates for these students.

The assessment project for Section B was administered to a BIOL241 class and consisted of ______(Judy Learn and Heidi Iverson participated in the assessment project)

The project was designed to evaluate student’s understanding of biology concepts in human anatomy and physiology and how well they can utilize critical thinking skills.

Goals for the Program

The short-term goals for the program are

1. Establish consistency in content and ELOs with courses taught in different modalities; on-campus, hybrid, and fully online

2. Work with the Advisors to ensure that students are in the correct course for their academic goals, that necessary pre-requisites for courses are completed, and courses taught in a series are completed in the expected order.

The long-term goals for the program are

1. Establish resources to support students who would otherwise not complete

2. Integrate more problem-based learning activities into courses and evaluation of primary scientific literature

Action Plan: (Need to choose a goal from above and develop an action plan)

Short term: As a department we are working with Student Advisors to properly place students in the correct course for their academic goals. We will meet with the Advisors and share our ideas and recommendations for course pre-requisites and the optimal course sequence for allied health care students.

Long Term: As a department we will continue to integrate more problem-based learning activities into the biology curricula. Students will be expected to read primary literature and share their review with classmates.