Enhancing Instruction in Upper Division Chemistry at California State University Fullerton

At California State University Fullerton the Departments of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Physics have jointly established an active learning instructional computer facility where students explore models and data in the upper division chemistry and physics curricula. This facility is also a component of the larger W.M. Keck Foundation Center for Molecular Structure (CMolS), a core research and education center where faculty and students throughout the California State University system have the opportunity for joint research and teaching activities directed at the determination and critical analysis of molecular structures. An array of Silicon Graphics workstations and a server housed in an electronic classroom provides a networking medium linking students and faculty across our curricula to resources and courses with common themes, but traditionally segregated. Through team teaching and utilization of resources and expertise across subdisciplines and disciplines, we are creating a learning pathway that coherently exposes our students in chemistry and biochemistry to more sophisticated problems and exploration. Computers provide visual reinforcement and inerpretation for concepts and principles that students may have difficulty understanding and that cannot be treated easily or well by the problem-solving methodology. Our students have responded enthusiastically to the electronic classroom, and introduction of chemical computation into the curriculum has had a positive pedagogical impact.