Graduation Year
2025
Document Type
Thesis
Degree
M.S.
Degree Name
Master of Science (M.S.)
Degree Granting Department
Chemistry
Major Professor
Scott E. Lewis, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Jeffrey Raker, Ph.D.
Committee Member
John Ferron, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Ioannis Spanopoulos, Ph.D.
Keywords
Retention, Scaffolding, Persistence
Abstract
There is a need for capable STEM graduates to fill needed STEM career gaps, particularly for people who have been historically under-represented in the STEM field (e.g., women, people of color, people of lower economic status, etc.). A course that have great impact would be General Chemistry which typically acts as a pre-requisite for manty STEM majors and careers. The efforts to be described in this thesis was conducted at a large, public doctoral granting university in the southeastern United States of America. The first effort described in this thesis explores how students solve different types of stoichiometry-based problems along with the potential influence of supplementary table representations on students’ solution processes. One key finding is that students had a tendency to omit the units of their calculated values that could potentially be related to their likelihood of choosing a common error on the exam. Another key finding is that students were found to apply the dilution equation (M1V1 = M2V2) for the solution stoichiometry problem, even when the dilution equation assumes a 1:1 mole ratio that would not apply to the solution stoichiometry problem. The second effort involves investigating the relationship between students’ challenge perceptions while taking general chemistry and their performance on the final exam in both the GCI and GCII class as well as on STEM students’ persistence to enroll into the GCII course. A key finding was that, while all three factors did have a relationship with both final exam performance and persistence to GCII, the Challenges with Teaching factor did not appear to have a uniquely significant relationship with either measure of students’ success when analyzed with regression analyses. Chemistry related challenges were found to have a fairly consistent uniquely significant relationship with both STEM students’ persistence to GCII and on final exam performance. Though it was also observed that Individual challenges saw an increase in its unique influence on final exam performance from GCI to GCII.
Scholar Commons Citation
Kim, Dianna, "Efforts to Improve General Chemistry Student Success: Describing Stoichiometry Solution Patterns and Investigating Challenge Perceptions" (2025). USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/etd/10971
