WHAT DO INSTRUCTORS HAVE TO REVIEW, AND DOES THE NEED TO REVIEW INDICATE A DISCONNECT OR GAP BETWEEN INSTRUCTOR EXPECTATIONS AND STUDENT ABILITIES?

Geoscience instructors frequently review material with students at the start of a course and then off and on throughout the rest of the semester in order to support student success. Instructors often consider the need for review a necessary evil and voice frustration that it is needed; students often insist that they have never seen the review material before. This mismatch may represent a gap between professor expectations and their students’ actual academic abilities at the start of the semester. Nicoll and Francisco (2001) and Bradford et al. (2018) have identified that disconnects between professor expectations and student academic skills can negatively impact student success in introductory and physical chemistry courses.

This study aims to identify actual or perceived mismatches between instructor expectations of their students’ academic preparations and their students’ previous academic preparations in geoscience courses. To achieve this objective, we are using a multi-phase approach that includes surveying and interviewing instructors and their students at an R1 university. We will present preliminary results of this research from a survey conducted during the Spring 2022 semester. The survey attempts to identify what weaknesses professors are seeing in their students, what skills instructors think students need to succeed in their courses, and how professors believe we can bridge the identified gaps. The overall goal of this research is to help address the identified gaps by sharing information with professors and students and assisting professors in determining appropriate curriculum or learning objective changes that could improve overall geoscience program outcomes.