The lessons in ChemTutor are now in the first ohases of preparation and testing a t the University of ~ i c h i g a n . ChemTutor has, for the most part, successfully addressed the problems of implementation, information suitability and availability identified a t the start of this note. During two semesters of limited trials, the LessonMaker-produced ChemTutor lessons were made available to approximately one fourth of the 2500 student General Chemistry population on the Ann Arbor campus. More than 750 voluntary student uses of ChemTutor were monitored during these trials (conducted during the winter and fall terms of 1989). The size of this a o u o of users reoresented a eood samnle (about 400 indigduais, or 16%)k t h e large i d relativky heteroeeneous uooulation of students enrolled over two terms 1% the va&o;s General Chemistry courses offered a t this university. Several facts in these initial trials were encouraging. Students spent, an average, between an hour and an hour and a half an each use of ChemTutor; Students using ChemTutor once during a term, came hack to use it again (71%repeat users); On average, student users performed at least 3%better than the class average; .The profile of student users showed that more women and minority students used ChemTutor than the population in the classes as a whole (65% women and 13%minority student users, compared to our typical 45% women and 4% minority class populations). The last two mentioned facts are important, since those who traditionally have been excluded from scientific and particularly chemistry professions have also had a history of chemistry test scores well below class averages. LessonMaker is being used currently to prepare instructional software for undergraduate bioloev a s well a s chemistrycourses a t t h e ~ n s e r s iot f~~ i c h i g & .Plans call for refinement of the LessonMaker oromam. including automatic importing of graphics, increased usage of hypermedia, and networking (so that one stack can serve many users). LessonMaker testing will go hand in hand with ChemTutor Lesson preparation and testing. Our intention is to report the results of planned full-scale availability of the ChemTutor Lessons a t national meetings and in this Journal.
A Role-Playing Exercise Using a Computer Simulation David M. Whisnant Wofford College Sparianburg, SC 29301 I n the recent report of the Project on Liberal Education and the Sciences (11,one of the recommendations was that "the ethical, social, economic, and political dimensions of science" be included i n science courses. This may encourage us to use other teaching methods along with traditional lectures and discussions. One possible method is illustrated by role-playing exercises that have been used in general chemistry (2)and analytical chemistry (3)courses. For the past eight years I have assigned two computer simulations in my chemistry course for nonscientists (4). These simulations involve students in scientific exploration and give them the opportunity to appreciate how science works. The students approach the simulations a s if they were doing actual experiments. They gather "experimental" data and other information from a simulation, analvze and dizest the information. draw conclusions. and thenwrite a scientific report. This year I made one df the simulations, BCTC, the basis for a class role-playing exercise.
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Journal of Chemical Education
The BCTC simulation requires students to work on a solution to a realistic problem that must be dealt with, even in the absence of complrtc information. In this simulation a susperted carcinogen called BCTC has hren found in :I river below a chemical plant that is relurtant t , ~ install pollution-control devices. Metroburg, a city below the plant, draws its drinking water from the river but also is economically dependent on the plant. Students working with the simulation can sample the water, sediment, and fish from the river; analyze them for BCTC and other chemicals; consult the library for information on chemicals, mortality tables, and health records; find LD,,'s for different types of animals; and project the economic wnsequences of installing pollution control devices in the plant. The analytical data show that BCTC is present, but the laboratory animal data is ambiguous and the Metroburg health records show no significant increase in deaths due to cancer. The plant would experience severe cash flow problems if forced to install and operate pollution abatement equipment. There is no clear cut solution to the prob. . lem. At the beeinnine of the role-nlavina exercise based on this simulation, t i e students are given a handout that describes available resources. The handout also mentions an upcoming news conference on the BCTC controversy In which four r?ouvs ol'riti7ens are mvolved. The followmc description~ofthe groups are taken from the handout. a
"
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Enuimnmentalists: The hue and cry from the environmen-
talists raised this issue in the fint dace. The enviranmwtalisra are afraid t h a t Ies\~ngRCTC in the river rfferrrvely mnkcs the utircns of Ntrrlrburg t n r n ex. penmental nmmal~.Thrs nrr in Favor uf lnstall~ngpullution abatement equipment in the plant. Corporare O f f r r d s :The rorpnrate offic~als fcrl rhat BCTC is nor a demonstmtcd mwronmentnl hazard, but simply nn issue stirred up b y cnvironmenral extrcmlsri. Although they support further research into the matter, they are reluctant to install expensive pollution control equipment that threatens their plant economically. Townspeople: The townspeople are afraid of being lost in the fray. They are frightened about the health of their families hut also are worried about the economic wellbeing of the plant. They would like to find some solution that doesn't put them at risk. News Media: Newspaper reporters and TV crews have descended on Metroburg for the news conference. They suspect the environmentalists of making an issue out of nothing, solely for the publicity. They also suspect that the corporati& may he stalling and in the process endangering the lives of Metroburg citizens. The next Pulitzer Prize far investigative reoortine is in the backs of their minds. The members of the class are divided up among these groups, five people or so in each one. Their assignment is to work on the computer simulation, choose roles, plan t h e i r presentation, a n d come to class in two weeks oreoared for a 50-minute news conference. At the beein. ning of the news conference, three groups-the environmentalists, the corporate officials, and the townspeoplepresent five-minute s t a t e m e n t s . After t h e initial statements the members of the news media then question the different groups. In the interest of fairness, the groups also are allowed to question each other. Everyone in the same group receives the same grade for the exercise. Each group's grade is based on a number of factors:
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the quality of a written brief describingtheir position, which they hand in before the news conference; the force of their arguments during the news conference; the originality of their presentation; and the extent to which all members of the group participate. An assessment of each p u p ' s performance is made by three
people who are present at the news conference tc act as judges.
The students take this exercise seriously. Thought and planning are evident from the initial statements, the question and answer Deriod. and the roles chosen by the participants. For in2ance,among the townspeople invented by the students were the owner of a small restaurant, concerned about his business; a mother of small children, worried about their health and her husband's job a t the plant; a n environmental activist, impatient with the footIdragging over the issue; and the mayor of the city, mainly worried about being conciliatory and bringing the two sides tocether. From the heated discussions that develop during t h i news conference, it is obvious that the students are involved-certainly more so than I have ever experienced in my lectures. This role-~lavincexercise has a number of advantages. It is a h ~ l i d t i c a ~ ~ r o that a c h integrates many topics discussed in lecture durinc the semester and places them in a wider context. It confr&ts the students with a science-related issue t h a t h a s political, economic, and social ramifications and forces the students to deal with them. Although the exercise is concerned with a limited case, pollution &om one plant affecting one city, it is easily extrapolated to the nation as a whole. In fact, the solutions favored by many of the students--delaying action until more research has been done, obtaining government tax breaks for the wrporation, or passing laws to force a solution to the problem-are reminiscent of solutions chosen for national environmental problems. Answers to examination questions about this exercise indicate that the students learned a t least as much, and possibly more, this year than they have in the past when they worked on the simulation individually and wrote a report. In particular, this year I noticed that there were more correct answers to exam questions concerned with the subtleties of the simulation, such as the biomagnification of the BCTC and the latency period for cancers. The exercise requires only one class period for the news conference and lends itself to a 20-25 person class. I plan to use it again and possibly to expand the role-playing in the class in the future. The BCTC simulation upon which this exercise is based is available from Project SERAPHIM. A copy of the roleplaying handout can be obtained by sending a stamped, self-addressed envelope to David Whisnant, Wofford College, 429 N. Church St., Spartanburg, SC 29303-3663. Acknowledgment The author would like to exoress his aooreciation to the teachers a t the 1990 Camille and ~ e n r y ~ r e y f Institute us on the Chemistrv of Water, who were the inspiration for this exercise andthe first to play these roles. -
reports only news and does not require an annual membership fee or solicit monetary contributions. Furthermore, receiving a newsletter from the department in the area of their major makes it a personal experience. With this in mind, in 1976 we started the York College Chemistry Alumni Newsletter. This yearly effort was met with great enthusiasm by the alumni. Afew years later, the chairperson of the Department of Natural Sciences, in view of its success. orooosed that it be ex~andedto include the alumni from'ihebiology, geology, i n d physics disciplines. As a result. the title was chanced to York College Natural ~ c i e n c e sAlumni Newsletter. As a consequence of this change, this project became almost unmanageable with a card file system. It soon became apparent that a computerized database management system was essential for the general tasks of adding new information, sorting, searching, printing reports and labels, editing and deleting data. The Database Management Program
The dBASE 111 PLUS2 database management software is a ~owerfuland flexible system for storing, - organizing, analyzing, and retrieving information on a microcomputer. There are other excellent packages commercially available, but this particular onehas met with wide acceptance. Its current availability in our department was the deciding factor for its use with an IBM-PC machine to manage our alumni newsletter. A menu-driven cornouter . Droeram was written to be simple and user friendly. I t consists of three primary screens. beeinnine with a main screen, shown as Fimre 1. " In ~ i g u r ei,"B" selected; then the name " ~ o n t k a is typed. When the "return" key ispressed, Figure 2 appears
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Figure 1. This is the "Main"screen. It first appears upon loading the "Alumni " program. Here, " B was selected and the name of an alumnus typed in. When the "Enter"key is depressed, Figure 2 comes up on the screen . To enter a new entry, " A is depressed, and a screen like Figure 2 appears; however, the highlighted areas will be blank.
Use of a Database Management System in the Preparation of a Science Alumni Newsletter Emanuel P. Manche Depanment of hat~raScences Yor
