Browsing by Author "Gavrin, Andy"

Now showing 1 - 5 of 5
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    Central Indiana STEM Talent Expansion Program: Student and Faculty Interventions
    (IEEE, 2015-08) Hundley, Stephen P.; Feldhaus, Charles R.; Watt, Jeffrey X.; Marrs, Kathleen A.; Gavrin, Andy; Mzumara, Howard; Department of Technology and Leadership Communication, School of Engineering and Technology
    Funded by 5-year, $2M grant from the National Science Foundation, the Central Indiana STEM Talent Expansion Program (CI-STEP) at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) is creating a pipeline of students and a campus culture change to increase the number of undergraduates obtaining Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) degrees. CI-STEP addresses initiatives needed for transforming the undergraduate STEM experience by propagating, expanding, and creating new evidence-based educational innovations in undergraduate STEM education at IUPUI.
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    Creating the STEM Education Research Institute: SERI
    (Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, 2013-04-05) Feldhaus, Charlie; Gavrin, Andy; Mutegi, Jomo
    SERI, The STEM Education Research Institute, is a new initiative of the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, based on collaboration among the Schools of Science, Education, and Engineering and Technology. This presentation will provide an overview of the mission, vision, and goals of SERI. It will also detail the organizational structure and leadership of SERI, and describe some of the initial projects SERI has undertaken. SERI offers a range of support to all IUPUI faculty interested in STEM Education research, including project development, evaluation, and dissemination. We are particularly interested in meeting researchers who wish to create educational components associated with new or ongoing research projects.
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    Engaging Students in a Large-Enrollment Physics Class Using an Academically Focused Social Media Platform
    (AAPT, 2017) Gavrin, Andy; Lindell, Rebecca; Physics, School of Science
    There are many reasons for an instructor to consider using social media, particularly in a large introductory course. Improved communications can lessen the sense of isolation some students feel in large classes, and students may be more likely to respond to faculty announce-ments in a form that is familiar and comfortable. Furthermore, many students currently establish social media sites for their classes, without the knowledge or participation of their instructors. Such “shadow” sites can be useful, but they can also become distributors of misinformation, or venues for inappropriate or disruptive discussions. CourseNetworking (CN) is a social media platform designed for the academic environment. It combines many features common among learning management systems (LMS’s) with an interface that looks and feels more like Facebook than a typical academic system. We have recently begun using CN as a means to engage students in an introductory calculus-based mechanics class, with enrollments of 150-200 students per semester. This article presents basic features of CN, and details our initial experiences and observations.
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    Identifying Connections and Potential Synergies among IUPUI STEM Education Initiatives
    (Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, 2013-04-05) Gavrin, Andy; Fore, Grant; Sorge, Brandon
    SERI is the new STEM Education Research Institute at IUPUI. One of its initial projects is a search for potential synergies among the many STEM education initiatives ongoing at IUPUI. The ultimate goal of this project is to establish best practices for identifying and implementing such synergistic connections among STEM education initiatives within a single large campus or consortium of geographically connected smaller campuses. The project will be implemented in three phases. During Phase 1, which is currently underway, SERI researchers will non-intrusively identify and categorize campus STEM education initiatives through IUPUI websites, institutional reports, and funding reports from foundations such as NSF and NIH. In Phase 2, researchers will both conduct fact-checking interviews with IUPUI faculty/staff and develop a comprehensive and accessible database of current STEM education initiatives across campus. With Phase 3, researchers will conduct an analysis of IUPUI’s initiatives using the database and, when needed, additional faculty/staff interviews both to assess internal synergy and cost-saving and to identify the potential for additional synergistic development at IUPUI. Following the completion of this tripartite process, results will be gathered and assembled into an NIH or NSF proposal requesting funding to formalize the process and expand it to a sample of other campuses.
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    Respecting Our Students
    (AAPT, 2015-10) Gavrin, Andy; Department of Physics, School of Science
    Giving our students the respect they deserve will improve their performance, our mutual interactions, and our satisfaction as teachers. This is obvious to many TPT readers, but there are times when we all, myself included, forget. There are times when our judgment is clouded by institutional culture, or our best intentions are subverted by the vexations of our roles as instructors. This essay is based on my own experience teaching physics (primarily at a public urban university, primarily at the introductory level), and on conversations with many colleagues here and elsewhere. I hope this essay will serve as a reminder to all of us that we must treat our students with respect, and that the rewards of doing so are worth the effort of rethinking some of our behaviors.