Hi Jeff, Wow. This and another posting on psychteach suggest that nationally the experience of teaching intro to psych is relatively poor in terms of outcomes.
I have to say that my perspective is from a private liberal arts college so that we are rather selective in our admissions. We admit our maximum we can handle every fall and our retention rates are in the mid to high 80's which I understand is quite exceptional. I think this last year we might have nudged 90%. In terms of intro psych my completion rates are often in the high 90's and most often at 100%. Almost no one drops and if they do it is not because they are doing poorly but because of personal reasons. I don't think I am hard or easy, but in the middle someplace. I teach for mastery so students who are willing to do lots of work over and over and over again are likely to improve their grades by as much as a full letter as long as they are willing to eventually master the content. I get very few, but a few, every semester, who blow it all off. But they don't drop the class, they simply fare poorly in terms of grades. So the question asked on the other list was about final exam grades and I was surprised that nationally the level is so low because I've always had higher grades; but the person posing the question was actually shocked that the national statistics seem to be so high! I think it was around 80% if I recall correctly, and my students perform a bit better than that. So, I have to say that I have not realized how 'spoiled' I might be in my situation and that our students are substantially more dedicated. I have had taught in two other programs in recent years and again, in both situations, because they were again expensive, privately funded institutions which both did carry a large number of students on financial aid (but still, if you are taking out loans most of the time the family has some where-with-all to pay for it in the end), and my experiences were very similar. In fact in my last experience at a private university India I'd say the students were overwhelmingly motivated and bright and almost OCD in their education-related behaviors. Perhaps these national statistics take into account people like me, who have been spoiled with great, motivated students. (hahaha, or maybe I motivate them ;-) but I don't think so!) Annette Annette Kujawski Taylor, Ph. D. Professor, Psychological Sciences University of San Diego 5998 Alcala Park San Diego, CA 92110 [email protected] ________________________________________ From: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) digest [[email protected]] Sent: Friday, February 05, 2016 10:00 PM Subject: Successful Completion Rates -- Trying Once Again From: "Jeffry Ricker, Ph.D." <[email protected]> Date: Fri, 5 Feb 2016 11:09:38 -0700 Hi all, In my Introduction to Psychology course, during the Fall and Spring semesters, I have a “successful completion rate” (i.e., the percentage of students enrolled on the first day of class who earn a C or better for their final grade) of about 55% over the last three years. When I used to teach in the summers, my successful completion rate was around 85-90%; and I also get about 85-90% successful completion in honors’ sections of the course. A couple of colleagues who teach about the same number of sections as I do have successful completion rates of about 75% and 85%. It’s possible that they are much better at teaching than I am. On the other hand, it’s also possible that the rigor of our courses differ. For example, the total number of points earned on my tests correlate about 0.62 with scores on a psychology reading-comprehension test that I developed. Reading is extremely important in my class. Why am I telling you this? First,the “successful completion rate” metric is becoming imortant for evaluating teachers and programs (take a look around the U.S. Dep of Education Website, e.g., here: http://www.ed.gov/accreditation?src=rn ). And the tone of some publications and announcements for teaching workshops/programs either imply or state outright that faculty are the primary cause of low successful completion rates. Second, I was hoping that you would share with me (probably privately, off-list) your experiences with this metric and also what your successful completion rates for intro psych are. I’m very curious about variations across different types of institutions. Best, Jeff -- --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Jeffry Ricker, Ph.D. Professor of Psychology --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Social/Behavioral Sciences Scottsdale Community College 9000 E. Chaparral Road Scottsdale, AZ 85256-2626 Office: SB-123 Fax: (480) 423-6298 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DrJeffryRicker/timeline/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/pub/jeffry-ricker/3b/511/438 --- END OF DIGEST --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected] To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13534.4204dc3a11678c6b1d0be57cfe0a21b0&n=T&l=tips&o=48073 or send a blank email to leave-48073-13534.4204dc3a11678c6b1d0be57cfe0a2...@fsulist.frostburg.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. 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