Redesign of General Chemistry

This work looks at the early stages, up to and including the pilot for the new program, of the general chemistry redesign at ETSU. The redesign was initiated to deal with the dramatic growth in the number of students enrolling in general chemistry due to the opening of the pharmacy school and to reduce the drop-fail-withdraw rate among the students. The results of the pilot indicate that the majority of the problem may be explained by inadequate preparation prior to enrolling in general chemistry especially with regard to basic math and reasoning skills. This is based on the results of the ACS Testing Service's California Chemistry Diagnostic Test. Addressing this and the other issues resulted in a ~15 percentage point increase in the number of students remaining in the course until the final exam, and a ~10% drop in the drop-fail-withdraw rate without a significant change in the class average