PEER REVIEW IN UPPER-LEVEL GEOLOGY COURSES INCREASES STUDENT SUCCESS WHILE DECREASING INSTRUCTOR WORKLOAD

High-impact educational practices (HIPs), such as writing-intensive courses and undergraduate research, promote deep learning by actively engaging students. Numerous initiatives to increase the use of these practices have emerged throughout the United States, including the University System of Georgia. However, utilization of these practices is often not applied systematically due in part to the perceived time investment. This presentation demonstrates how utilizing peer review in HIPs courses can increase student engagement and persistence while also decreasing the time investment required by the instructor. Students in an upper-level geology course (GEOL 3350: Coastal Geomorphology) performed semester-long independent research projects using Google Earth Pro to analyze temporal change along a coastal environment of their choice. The projects were scaffolded onto the course material such that students applied the newly learned course content to their chosen location each week. Periodically, students documented and presented their progress to the class. Each student reviewed two other students’ work, which allowed the instructor to provide a shorter review than would be necessary without peer review, saving approximately 20 hours of instructor time over the semester. Before the first peer review, students were taught how to depersonalize the reviewed work, personalize their own experience, and provide specific examples for improvement. Students reported that while this course was relatively difficult (63%), they learned more (100%) and preferred the structure of this course compared to other courses (100%). In effect, the utilization of peer review in this writing-intensive, research-based course both improved student success and decreased time and effort invested by the instructor.