Research

Research themes

Development of new methods to characterize instructional practices in STEM college classrooms


COPUS Profiles

We leveraged the Classroom Observation Protocol for Undergraduate STEM (a segmented protocol that captures instructor's and students' behaviors) to identify instructional styles based on a subset of the 25 COPUS behavioral codes.

  • COPUS profile app: This app is a comprehensive analytical package for COPUS data (inter-rater reliability, classification of observations into COPUS profiles, summary of percent 2-min intervals for each behaviors or group of behaviors) - http://www.copusprofiles.org/

  • Stains, M., Harshman, J., Barker, M. K., Chasteen, S. V., Cole, R., DeChenne-Peters, S. E., . . . Young, A. M. (2018) Anatomy of STEM teaching in North American universities. Science, 359(6383), 1468 DOI: 10.1126/science.aap8892

  • Original study: Lund, T.J., Pilarz, M., Velasco, J.B., Chakraverty, D., Rosploch, K., Undersander, M., and Stains, M. (2015) The Best of Both Worlds: Building on the COPUS and RTOP Observation Protocols to Easily and Reliably Measure Various Levels of Reformed Instructional Practices, CBE Life Sciences Education, 14(2), ar18 DOI: 10.1187/cbe.14-10-0168

This work is generously supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF DUE 1256003, NSF CAREER 1552448).


Laboratory Observation Protocol for Undergraduate STEM (LOPUS)

We leveraged the Classroom Observation Protocol for Undergraduate STEM (a segmented protocol that captures instructor's and students' behaviors) to develop a similar protocol but for the STEM laboratory.

  • Velasco, J. B., Knedeisen, A., Xue, D., Vickrey, T. L., Abebe, M., & Stains, M. (2016). Characterizing Instructional Practices in the Laboratory: The Laboratory Observation Protocol for Undergraduate STEM. Journal of Chemical Education, 93(7), 1191-1203 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.6b00062


Peer Instruction Observation Protocol

We are developing an observation protocol that will help identify critical components to the implementation of Peer Instruction (Peer Instruction is an instructional strategy in which students are asked to vote on a question individually, discuss with their peers if most of the class is incorrect and revote on the same question after discussion). Our goal is to develop a measure the fidelity of implementation of Peer Instruction.

  • Vickrey, T, Rosploch, K., Rahmanian, R., Pilarz, M. and Stains, M. (2015) Research-based implementation of Peer Instruction: A literature review, CBE Life Sciences Education, 14(1) DOI: 10.1187/cbe.14-11-0198

  • Stains, M. and Vickrey, T. (2017) Fidelity of implementation: An overlooked yet critical construct to establish effectiveness of evidence-based instructional practices, CBE Life Sciences Education, 16(1), rm1 DOI: 10.1187/cbe.16-03-0113

This work is generously supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF DUE 1256003, NSF CAREER 1552448).

Characterization of the impact of different types of pedagogical professional development programs

We employ longitudinal mixed methods design to characterize the impact of different types of professional development program.


Cottrell Scholars Collaborative New Faculty Workshop

We are evaluating the impact of this national pedagogical workshop, which targets new assistant professors in chemistry.

  • Baker, L.A., Chakraverty, D., Columbus, L., Feig, A.L., Jenks, W.J., Pilarz, M., Stains, M., Waterman, R. and Wesemann, J.L. (2014) Cottrell Scholars Collaborative New Faculty Workshop: Professional Development for New Chemistry Faculty, Journal of Chemical Education, 91(11), 1874-1881 DOI: 10.1021/ed500547n

  • Stains, M., Pilarz, M., and Chakraverty, D. (2015) Short and Long-Term Impacts of the Cottrell Scholars Collaborative New Faculty Workshop. Journal of Chemical Education, 92(9), 1466-1476 DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.5b00324


Scientific Teaching Workshop Series

We developed two workshop series for STEM faculty at UNL (see Pedagogical Support page) and are conducting research to measure their effectiveness.


This work is generously supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF DUE 1256003, NSF CAREER 1552448, NSF DUE 712060).

Identification of individual, departmental, and institutional factors that influence instructors' instructional decisions

We are interested in identifying levers and barriers to the process of instructional change in STEM disciplines in higher education.

  • Lund, T.J. and Stains, M. (2015) The Importance of Context: An Exploration of Factors Influencing the Adoption of Student-Centered Teaching among Chemistry, Biology, and Physics Faculty, International Journal of STEM Education, 2:13 DOI: 10.1186/s40594-015-0026-8

This work is generously supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF DUE 1256003, NSF DUE 1347814, NSF CAREER 1552448, NSF DUE 1726409, NSF DUE 1726379).

Exploration of faculty and teaching assistants thinking about their teaching

We are interested in better understanding how faculty and teaching assistants plan their teaching, how they navigate live implementation of their plan, and how they reflect on their teaching.

  • Velasco, J.B. and Stains, M. (2015) Exploring the Relationships between Perceptions of Tutoring and Tutoring Behaviours: A focus on Graduate Students serving as Peer Tutors to College-Level Chemistry Students, Chemical Education Research and Practice, 16, 856-868 DOI:10.1039/C5RP00103J

This work is generously supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF DUE 1256003, NSF DUE 1347814, NSF CAREER 1552448).