Sustaining student facilitated learning via a workbook: ending the cycle of grant dependency

• In Event: Science Education Oral Session 1

Abstract

The University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) has developed and enhanced the talent pool of undergraduate students in science and engineering from the Paso del Norte region of the United States by implementing and honing the learning intervention of Peer Led Team Learning (PLTL) in General Chemistry I and II. Our 17-year program is now significantly funded via a self-sustaining, self-funding strategy involving the creation and sale of Workbooks, student-authored learning materials published through a collaborating non-profit publisher. As in other PLTL Programs, students enroll in lecture and must co-register in required, small-section PLTL Workshops. The learning in each Workshop is facilitated by an undergraduate Peer Leader, a student who has done well in the course and has been trained for the purpose. Funds to pay the leaders initially came from National Science Foundation (NSF) grants. When external funding neared an end, this very successful PLTL intervention was continued by involving the Peer Leaders themselves in authoring learning materials. The undergraduate-Leader-authored materials represent intellectual property. This IP is donated to a non-profit, which organizes the materials into learning modules in Workbooks, and the Workbooks are sold to the local bookstore. What would normally be called ‘royalties’ are donated by the non-profit publisher to a university Gift Fund, with the Gift Fund providing a cost center used for paying for training costs and for the hourly wages of the Leaders. Workbooks organize the content of the PLTL Workshops, provide content sequence for faculty lecturers, and significantly fund the program.

Authors

• James E. Becvar, University of Texas at El Paso

• Geoffrey Saupe, University of Texas at El Paso

• Juan Noveron, University of Texas at El Paso

• Mahesh Narayan, University of Texas at El Paso