Student experiences with authentic research in a remote, introductory course-based undergraduate research experience in physics

[This paper is part of the Focused Collection on Instructional labs: Improving traditions and new directions.] Participation in undergraduate research experiences (UREs) has been identified as an important way of increasing undergraduate retention, interest, and identity within the sciences. Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) have been shown to have similar outcomes to UREs but can reach a larger number of students at one time and are accessible to any student simply through enrollment in a course. One key component of a CURE is that students must participate in authentic scientific discovery in which they answer a question where the answer is initially unknown to both students and the scientific community. Here, we present student experiences with authentic research in a large, introductory physics CURE conducted remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic. We use student responses to a closed ended survey question, as well as written responses to an open-ended end-of-course assignment to investigate what aspects of real research students felt that they participated in and the extent to which students felt that they participated in authentic research. Most students in the course felt like they engaged in real-world research during the course and a large number of students highlighted their experience with authentic research when asked to describe their experience in the course more broadly. We discuss which elements of the course may have contributed to the students' experiences of authentic research.

Instructor perspectives on the emergency transition to remote instruction of physics labs

Laboratory courses are an important part of the undergraduate physics curriculum. During physics labs, students can engage in authentic, hands-on experimental practices, which can prepare them for graduate school, research laboratories, and jobs in industry. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic in Spring 2020, colleges and universities across the world rapidly transitioned to teaching labs remotely. In this work, we report results from a survey of physics lab instructors on how they adapted their courses in the transition to emergency remote teaching. We identified three common themes in the instructors' responses: (i) using a variety of simulation tools, (ii) changing learning goals of the courses to be more concept focused, and (iii) reducing group work due to equity and technological concerns. We discuss the common challenges and successes reported by instructors, which leads to themes and lessons that can impact future remote and in -person instruction.

Undergraduate student experiences in remote lab courses during the COVID-19 pandemic

The 2020???2021 academic year was a unique time for many instructors who had to adapt their courses to be conducted remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This was especially challenging for physics lab courses, which usually emphasize hands-on experiments. Although many courses have now returned to in-person teaching, the possibility remains of future disasters necessitating similar remote courses. It is important to understand how undergraduate students experienced remote physics lab courses during the pandemic, including what aspects of the courses contributed to positive student outcomes. To investigate this, we surveyed over 5000 students from 24 different institutions, asking how the students engaged with their physics lab courses during the 2020???2021 academic year. Here, we describe the frequency with which the students performed various class activities, aspects of the course environment, challenges the students faced, aspects of the courses the students found enjoyable, and some student outcomes. We further study the impact of the course activities and course environment on four of the outcomes (self-reported learning of lab skills, self-reported learning of concepts, course enjoyment, and development of a sense of community). We find that students who were provided clear expectations, had enough time for their coursework, frequently worked in groups, and frequently had access to guidance from their instructors were more likely to report positive outcomes. This work demonstrates the importance of certain aspects of lab courses for several desirable outcomes in remote lab courses during a pandemic, with findings that may transfer to in-person or remote lab courses in the future.

Impacts on student learning, confidence, and affect and in a remote, large-enrollment, course-based undergraduate research experience in physics

Over the last decade, course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) have been recognized as a way to improve undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education by engaging students in authentic discovery. CUREs have been shown to have positive benefits similar to traditional undergraduate research experiences;however, they can reach a larger number of students and are open to all students who enroll in the course. Motivated by the need to redesign the large introductory physics lab at The University of Colorado-Boulder to be fully remote in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we designed and implemented the first remote, large-enrollment, physics CURE. Here, we detail the motivations and the challenges when designing the course, and provide detailed descriptions of the course components. Throughout the course, we collected course artifacts and administered surveys to the students. Based on these data sources, we find that this course helped students gain research skills and coding confidence, engage in productive and enjoyable teamwork experiences, and feel motivated and interested in experimental physics research. © 2022 authors. Published by the American Physical Society.

Lab instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic: Effects on student views about experimental physics in comparison with previous years

Physics lab instructors were forced to adapt their courses in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We investigate the impact these changes had on student views towards experimental physics as measured by the Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey for Experimental Physics (E-CLASS). Analysis of the responses from over 1600 students in both spring and fall semesters and performing a comparison with the same courses in 2019 shows that student total E-CLASS scores were not lower in 2020 compared to 2019. Nevertheless, in the Fall 2020 data, we find that there is a variation in the mean E-CLASS scores on some individual questions when compared to previous years. © 2021 authors. Published by the American Physical Society. Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.