A model for using a concept inventory as a tool for students' assessment and faculty professional development

This essay describes how the use of a concept inventory has enhanced professional development and curriculum reform efforts of a faculty teaching community. The Host Pathogen Interactions (HPI) teaching team is composed of research and teaching faculty with expertise in HPI who share the goal of improving the learning experience of students in nine linked undergraduate microbiology courses. To support evidence-based curriculum reform, we administered our HPI Concept Inventory as a pre- and postsurvey to approximately 400 students each year since 2006. The resulting data include student scores as well as their open-ended explanations for distractor choices. The data have enabled us to address curriculum reform goals of 1) reconciling student learning with our expectations, 2) correlating student learning with background variables, 3) understanding student learning across institutions, 4) measuring the effect of teaching techniques on student learning, and 5) demonstrating how our courses collectively form a learning progression. The analysis of the concept inventory data has anchored and deepened the team's discussions of student learning. Reading and discussing students' responses revealed the gap between our understanding and the students' understanding. We provide evidence to support the concept inventory as a tool for assessing student understanding of HPI concepts and faculty development.     

Communication Research

INSIDE FAMILY VIEWING: ETHNOGRAPHIC RESEARCH ON TELEVISION'S AUDIENCES by James Lull (New York: Routledge, 1991—$55.00/17.95, ISBN 0-415-04414-6 hard, 0-415-04997-0 paper, 190 pp.)

PROGRESS IN COMMUNICATION SCIENCES, VOLUME X edited by Brenda Dervin and Melvin Voigt (Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1991—$75.00 institutional price/$35.00 personal price, ISBN 0-89391-645-5, 336 pp.)

MEDIA RESEARCH TECHNIQUES by Arthur Asa Berger (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1991—$28.00/14.00, ISBN 0-8039-4179-X hard, 0-8039-4180-3, 148 pp.)

THE ANNUAL REVIEW 1990 by the Institute for Information Studies (a joint project of the Aspen Institute and Northern Telecom; for information write to Aspen Institute, Wye Center, PO Box 222, Queenstown, MD 21658, price not given, paper, ISBN 0-89843-094-0, 249 pp.)

COMMUNICATION THEORY: A JOURNAL OF THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION ASSOCIATION (Guilford Publications, 72 Spring St., New York, NY 10012—$60 for institutions/$30 for individuals, ISSN 1050-3293, quarterly)

CINCOM: COURSES IN COMMUNICATIONS 1989 compiled by Communications Library (Communications Institute, Lockbox 5891, 1535 Francisco St., San Francisco, CA 94101-5891—$35.00, paper, ISSN 0742-3632 and ISBN 0-934339-95-3, 100 pp.)

SESAME STREET RESEARCH BIBLIOGRAPHY: SELECTED CITATIONS RELATING TO SESAME STREET, 1969-1989 (June 1990, xx pp.)

WHAT RESEARCH INDICATES ABOUT THE EDUCATIONAL EFFECTS OF SESAME STREET (February 1991, 14 pp.)

“CHILDREN'S LEARNING FROM TELEVISION: RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT AT THE CHILDREN'S TELEVISION WORKSHOP,” Educational Technology Research and Development 38:4 (1990, 96 pp. ISSN 1042-1629)

SESAME STREET RESEARCH: A 20th ANNIVERSARY SYMPOSIUM (1990, 96 pp.)

CONTACT 1-2-3: RESEARCH BIBLIOGRAPHY (June 1990, 43 pp.)

GANNETT CENTER JOURNAL: “HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE INFORMATION AGE,” (Spring-Summer 1991, Vol 5, Nos. 2-3)

GANNETT CENTER JOURNAL: “MEDIA AND AMERICA'S SCHOOLS,” (Winter 1991, Vol 5, No. 1); both available from Gannett Center Journal, Columbia University, 2950 Broadway, New York, NY 10027—$5.00, paper, each, ISSN 0893-8342)

EXTENDING TELECOMMUNICATIONS SERVICE TO AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES by Stuart Brotman (Annenberg Washington Program, 1455 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Suite 200, Washington, DC 20004—free on request, paper, no ISBN given, 53 pp.)     

Assessment of the integration of AAMC Medical Informatics Objectives into the medical school curriculum

The School of Medicine at the Medical College of Virginia Campus of Virginia Commonwealth University examined the 2005/2006 medical school curriculum to ensure that students were prepared to meet the informatics objectives put forward by the AAMC Medical School Objectives Project published in 1998. The AAMC Medical Informatics Objectives Survey, issued in 2005, led the VCU School of Medicine to investigate the points of integration between informatics objectives and course syllabi for the first three years of the medical school curriculum. This analysis raised awareness of the informatics objectives with SOM faculty and staff and showed that more than 74% of the informatics objectives have been integrated into the curriculum.