Student performance in an online chemical engineering thermodynamics course on a summer schedule
- Conference
- Location
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Virtual On line
- Publication Date
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June 22, 2020
- Start Date
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June 22, 2020
- End Date
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June 26, 2021
- Conference Session
- Tagged Division
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Chemical Engineering
- Page Count
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9
- DOI
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10.18260/1-2--35232
- Permanent URL
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https://strategy.asee.org/35232
- Download Count
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327
Paper Authors
David L. Silverstein P.E. University of Kentucky
David L. Silverstein is a Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Kentucky. He is also the Director of the College of Engineering's Extended Campus Programs in Paducah, Kentucky, where he has taught since 1999. His PhD and MS studies in ChE were completed at Vanderbilt University, and his BSChE at the University of Alabama. Silverstein's research interests include conceptual learning tools and training, and he has particular interests in faculty development. He is the recipient of several ASEE awards, including the Fahein award for young faculty teaching and educational scholarship, the Corcoran award for best article in the journal Chemical Engineering Education (twice), and the Martin award for best paper in the ChE Division at the ASEE Annual Meeting.
Sarah A Wilson University of Kentucky
Sarah Wilson is a lecturer in the Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering at the University of Kentucky. She completed her bachelor’s degree at Rowan University in New Jersey before attending graduate school for her PhD at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, MA. Sarah conducted her thesis research on the production of the anti-cancer compound Paclitaxel (Taxol) through the use of plant cell cultures from the Taxus Yew Tree. Throughout her time at Rowan and UMass, she developed a passion for undergraduate education. This passion led her to pursue a career as a lecturer, where she could focus on training undergraduate chemical engineering students. She has been teaching at UK since 2015 and has taught Fluid Mechanics, Thermodynamics, Computational Tools and the Unit Operations Laboratory. She is especially interested in teaching scientific communication and integration of process safety into the chemical engineering curriculum.
Abstract
The authors have individually taught a course in chemical engineering thermodynamics at the University of Kentucky for many years, but starting in 2017 brought the course into an entirely online format for the summer term. The course coverage includes 1st and 2nd law (building off a pre-requisite material and energy balances course), equations of state, phase equilibrium, mixtures, and ideal/non-ideal VLE. Through three summer offerings, the authors have compared student performance as measured through a common final exam and entering class average GPA at time of enrollment with that of students taking the traditional offering. Performance in both the traditional face-to-face spring term offering (over 16 weeks) and the summer offerings (over 6 or 8 weeks) with small sample sizes (n<20 for each section) were compared without finding apparently significant differences. Details on course structure and other lessons learned regarding teaching foundational courses like this one online are offered.
Silverstein, D. L., & Wilson, S. A. (2020, June), Student performance in an online chemical engineering thermodynamics course on a summer schedule Paper presented at 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual On line . 10.18260/1-2--35232
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