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Show THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH RESEARCH POSTERS ON THE HILL 2013 A NOVEL APPROACH TO GENERATE CLASS ROOM SUCCESS IN A STATE UNIVERSITY Jacob Acharte (Holly Sebahar) Department of Chemistry University of Utah Buddy System a Novel Approach to Connect with Organic Chemistry Students in a Large Classroom Jacob Acholic, Jessica Edmands, Alexis Gosdls, Znchnry Fcrrell, Crystal Rasmussea, Max Bowman, Marcos Voldez, Wesley Kermao, Soo Heon Pork, Braydcn Forbes, Florence Fernandez, Holly Sebahar PhD Chemistry Department THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH Discussion In a classroom of 200+ students it can be both overwhelming and difficult for the professor and the students to build any sort of relationship (Mastrine, 2012), This lack of connection may have negative effects on the student's overall grade, college experience, and future career.This study presents a novel method to build a student-professor relationship using teaching assistance (TA) as the bridge. Method used was as followed: TA's would meet with students once a week to go over the previous discussion worksheets and exams. This gave the opportunity for the TA to get to know their students and to identify their special, individual needs. After each session the TA's reported back to the professor clarifying the student struggles. This allowed the professor to go over these problems during class. Students with lower grades (about C) were selected to comprise the majority of the group, but it was critical that a few students within the group have high grades. These specially selected groups gave the 'A and 'B' students an opportunity to impart their understanding to the students with lower grades. Towards the end of the semester, students in the program were given a survey to fill out regarding their experience. The results from this study were remarkable; students in the program reported back with 100% positive comments and overall good classroom experience. These positive remarks reflected student grades. The data revealed that students in the program scored 10.2% points higher than the class average on each exam. Furthermore, these students outscored the class average by 14.4% on the final exam. In conclusion, this study shows the importance of building a relationship with students in the classroom. The relationship not only affects the student's overall experience, but it also affects their grades. |