AAU grant supports STEM education efforts

AAU grant supports STEM education efforts

Washington University in St. Louis has been awarded a $20,000 “mini-grant” by the Association of American Universities to further existing efforts to improve undergraduate education in STEM disciplines. The funding will support programming organized by the Center for Integrative Research on Cognition, Learning and Education (CIRCLE).

Can large introductory science courses teach students to learn effectively?

In the past 10 years an active-learning course, called “Active Physics,” has gradually displaced lecture-based introductory courses in physics at Washington University in St. Louis. But are active-learning techniques effective when they are scaled up to large classes? A comprehensive three-year evaluation suggests that “Active Physics” consistently produces more proficient and confident students than the lecture courses it is replacing.