An Upper-Level Online Course for Undergraduates in Green

Article Cite This: J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXX−XXX

pubs.acs.org/jchemeduc

Graduate Student Designed and Delivered: An Upper-Level Online Course for Undergraduates in Green Chemistry and Sustainability Rebecca A. Haley,† Jessica M. Ringo,† Heather Hopgood, Kendra Leahy Denlinger, Anushree Das, and Daniel C. Waddell* Department of Chemistry, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio 45221, United States S Supporting Information *

ABSTRACT: Green chemistry and sustainability have garnered more awareness in the chemical industry in recent years, but green chemistry classes are still not commonplace for either the undergraduate or graduate student curriculum. Additionally, many departments are seeking avenues to reach greater numbers and types of learners through online courses. To address both needs, a small group of chemistry graduate students set out to design a 3-credit-hour upper-level online green chemistry course targeted at students most likely to apply green chemistry concepts in their future careers. The goals for the course included education in the basics of green chemistry (history, metrics, methodologies) along with opportunities to apply what they have learned and communicate it to a general audience. This process of developing modules and assessments for the discovery and application of green chemistry principles has enabled a supplementary education for the graduate students as well. Herein, the specific motivations of the graduate students to design the course, how green chemistry was presented to students in an online format, and how students responded to this type of class are provided. KEYWORDS: Green Chemistry, Upper-Division Undergraduate, Distance Learning/Self Instruction, Communication/Writing, Internet/Web-Based Learning, Organic Chemistry, Curriculum, Applications of Chemistry, Problem Solving/Decision Making, Public Understanding/Outreach

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chemistry courses and how the field can keep up with technological advances.5 Additionally, the 2015 Online Report Card, an organization that has been tracking online education for nearly 20 years, has stated that more than 1/4 of all students take at least one distance education course.6 Evidence that more and more students are taking online courses is overwhelming, and thus, more information on how to design these courses effectively is becoming available.7 Therefore, we decided to reach these students by offering the green chemistry course via an online platform. Graduate students interested in academia are inclined to take advantage of a plethora of opportunities to build the skills that one might need for a career in education. The success of the Preparing Future Faculty program attests to this inclination of graduate students.8 From a graduate student perspective, the opportunity to design a course, go through the course-approval process, and teach the course as well seems rarer and a highly valuable professional development opportunity. To the best of our knowledge, there is one example of a graduate student designed course in pharmaceutical leadership, but no or very few literature articles discussing graduate student designed and taught courses in chemistry.9 The desire to have this kind of opportunity is also echoed in a course that is formatted to give graduate students this skill at Colorado State University. In the Ecology Graduate Program, there is an interdisciplinary seminar where students can propose an ecology course to potentially go through the course-approval process and, if successful, teach it themselves.10

BACKGROUND

With green chemistry celebrating its 25th Anniversary1 in 2016, there has been an increasing number in stand-alone green chemistry courses as well as green chemistry topics and techniques integrated into existing chemistry courses. 2 However, the need to teach green chemistry, especially in an accessible online format, is reflected at many colleges and universities. This identified need in the curriculum inspired the authors, five graduate students and their faculty advisor for the Chemical Education Committee at University of Cincinnati,3 to design an online course titled “Green Chemistry and Sustainability.” While there are online green chemistry education resources and courses that currently exist,4 we wanted to create an online green chemistry course that focuses on building upon the students’ previous chemistry course knowledge, developing soft skills through an online format, and creating a sense of responsibility to keep green and sustainable techniques part of their future careers. Several other factors contributed to a graduate student led group to design a green chemistry course to be offered online. Before this course, there were no online courses offered through the Department of Chemistry at University of Cincinnati. One drawback of an online chemistry course is not meeting in person for a lab component. Because our green chemistry course did not require a lab component, it was amenable to adapting to an online learning environment. Since this issue is common to most if not all chemistry departments, it was thought that an online course in green chemistry may be a good way for more institutions to disseminate chemistry knowledge in an online format. As early as 2009, Chemical and Engineering News has reported on the benefits of offering online © XXXX American Chemical Society and Division of Chemical Education, Inc.

Received: September 21, 2017 Revised: February 24, 2018

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DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.7b00730 J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXX−XXX

Journal of Chemical Education

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Figure 1. Workflow for modules.

chemistry, chemical engineering, and related fields. A little over half of the students who took the class were chemical engineers. The remaining students comprised chemistry, environmental studies, and biology majors, with the distribution respective of how they are listed. While this was the makeup of the student population for this particular course, it is not to say that only these types of students are suited to take and succeed in the course. The content is primarily focused on organic synthetic methods, so students were required to have received a minimum of a C− for both general and organic chemistry as prerequisites. The number of students in the course was capped at 35; 33 students registered, and 30 students remained in the course for the duration of the semester. With two coinstructors and no teaching assistant, this class size was manageable. As online classes tend to be more inclined to have students actively contribute to their learning,5 frequent assignments and feedback were required. Consequently, the authors would suggest hiring a teaching assistant to help with grading if a larger class size is desired. Considering that students would have an assignment, reading quiz, or discussion board (sometimes all three!) due each week, the course modules containing the content and assessment details were released on a weekly basis to not overwhelm students. This weekly release was also a suggestion made by an online course designer working in the Center for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning. As the course progressed, there was mixed feedback to this strategy, with some students wanting to work ahead and plan their schedules for other classes more appropriately. Most students liked a consistent schedule of having the module released on a weekly basis, however. To remedy the students wanting to work ahead and plan, the instructors propose that a more detailed course calendar be made available to students so they can at least know how many assignments will be due in following weeks.

While several universities offer the Preparing Future Faculty program, there appear to be few opportunities in chemistry departments like that in Ecology at Colorado State University. Thus, the graduate student authors of this paper decided to create this opportunity through designing this online green chemistry course. Dispersing the responsibilities among five graduate students for creating this course made the task very manageable and dynamic. The authors were also originally part of a Chemical Education Committee that was created to give students who were interested in teaching an outlet to discuss current chemistry pedagogy. An assistant professor has been an excellent resource and guide for this group, so he was also able to serve as a faculty advisor for helping the course get approved and implemented to teach in Spring 2017. Having a current faculty member serve as a mentor is invaluable for this kind of experience since graduate students do not have as much experience in this area. This course was not just a valuable opportunity for the graduate students, however. The course itself was designed to attract students who will be working in industry upon graduation where green concepts are becoming increasingly more important on the job, as made evident by documents like the GC3 Policy Statement on Green Chemistry in Higher Education.11 In a short presurvey of the class, one student expressed their interest in green chemistry by stating “Green Chemistry is an important characteristic to consider in my field of chemical engineering. It is almost inherently a built-in code of conduct that should be considered when moving forward with production measures for the future.” The goal for this online green chemistry course is to use a combination of readings, discussion, and relatively open-ended assignments to help students learn how to apply the green chemistry “code of conduct” to their future careers.

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COURSE DETAILS This course was taught in Spring 2017 for the first time and was offered to students who have taken both general and organic chemistry, targeting upper-level undergraduate students in

Course Modules

The course was built and accessed by students through the learning management system (LMS) for the university. There B


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Students found their own resources, with guidance from instructors along with due dates for certain paper objectives throughout the semester

Introduction of Deceit and Denial,34 EPA Web site for PGCCA summaries35 An article on communicating chemistry,36 SciFinder,37 and The Up-Goer Five Text Editor38 to check scientific language

Selected chapters from Green Techniques for Organic Synthesis and Medicinal Chemistry,31 an article on photochemistry,32 and Paul Chirik’s PGCCA proposal33 Experimental procedures provided from Journal of Organic Chemistry

Details under “Types of Assignment”

Two papers, one for each type of objective

Group work paper with EcoScale evaluation and reflection where students compared metric outcomes for original procedure from JOC and that same procedure adjusted to fit a methodology from week 11 Discussion board; reading quiz

1−2 page paper detailing a solvent tree and relationship to solvent selection guides Answer guided questions on a group work blog

Reading quizzes; discussion board

Reading quiz; video presentation; discussion board

Abbreviated version of Jessop’s LCA project for undergraduates23

a Disasters that students were assigned: The Valley of the Drums; Ignition of a waste treatment facility in Bridgeport, NJ; Love Canal, NY; Toxic waste bursting in flames in Elizabeth, NJ; Dioxin contamination in Times Beach, MO; Toxic gas release in Bhopal, India.

15. Final Project

14. Communication II

Analyze Deceit and Denial and PGCCA summaries from a communication perspective Design an outreach event; write a summary that might be found in a newsletter: one for scientists and one for high school students without a strong science foundation Modules 1−14; postsurvey

Use current organic chemistry literature to apply what was learned in week 9; midterm feedback survey Catalysis, microwave, photochemistry, mechanochemistry, etc.

10. Solvent Alternatives Assessment 11. Alternative Methodologies

13. Communication I

Why we use solvents; what makes a solvent nongreen

9. Solvent Alternatives

Use current organic chemistry literature articles to apply what was learned in week 11

Catalysis and endangered elements; ibuprofen case study

8. Waste Prevention

12. Alternative Methodologies Assessment

Life cycle assessment

7. Metrics III

Discussion board; reading quiz; assignment asking students to apply metrics

An article16 on E-factor, a Web reference for E-factor,17 and PGCCA summary of Barry M. Trost’s proposal for atom economy18 The Van Aken EcoScale Web page and article,19,20 and a general article on metrics from Constable et al.21 An excerpt from Dicks’ book on metrics,22 and instructor video introducing assignment An article from Sheldon24 on reaction design efficiency, a New York Times article on catalysis,25 an episode of the BBC podcast Elements,26 and ibuprofen synthetic schemes Chem21 Web site,27 Searching for Green Solvents article,28 Lipshutz PGCCA proposal29 Journal of Organic Chemistry, GSK Solvent Selection Guide30

Discussion board; reading quiz; assignment asking students to apply metrics

Written reflection discussing their experience

Sigma-Aldrich’s Web site15

Analyze safety data sheets for chemicals found in everyday items; early term feedback survey Atom economy; E-factor

Reaction mass efficiency; EcoScale

Video presentation; discussion board

Anastas and Warner’s The 12 Principles of Green Chemistry14

The 12 principles of green chemistry

6. Metrics II

5. Metrics I

Video presentation; discussion board

Students found own resources with instructor guidance, if needed

Assessment Format Discussion board; reading quiz

Resources Chapter 5 of Deceit and Denial and a video from the EPA13

Module Content or Objective

Introductions; presurvey; become familiar with environmental regulations as detailed in Deceit and Denial12 Various historically significant chemical disastersa

Module Title

1. History of Green Chemistry I 2. History of Green Chemistry II 3. The 12 Principles of Green Chemistry 4. Hazards Identification

Table 1. Sequential List of Modules and Items Contained in Each Module

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Each discussion board also included posting a response to at least one other student’s thread. Original student posts were usually due a few days before the responses were due. This way, students had time to read each other’s posts before responding to them. Discussion board posts and responses were assessed based on the content of the posts. Points were awarded for relevance to the assignment, clarity of explanations, and justification of arguments. No points were awarded for congratulatory comments and feedback.

were no special software programs necessary for building this course, so any LMS should be amenable to creating this course, and it is recommended that instructors use whatever LMS to which their students are already accustomed. The content was organized into individual modules, which were released every week on Mondays at 6:00 am. Each module was formatted the same, with differences only appearing in the type of assessment and the resources provided. The modules always had a title, an introduction video from the instructors detailing the module, a recap video from the instructors going over any misunderstandings or key conclusions from the previous module, an objectives section, an overview section, a resources section, and the appropriate assignments section(s). While each week varied with individual assignments, the workflow for students and instructors remained consistent. Figure 1 shows this general workflow of how the online course progressed weekly. Additionally, screenshots of one of the modules can be found in the Supporting Information to help visualize the module from the student perspective. Since most students have an idea of what green chemistry is, but not much history or context as to why it is separate from “ordinary” chemistry, the designers of the course proposed a general timeline of the following: 1. History of green chemistry 2. Safety 3. Metrics 4. Waste prevention 5. Alternative methodologies 6. Communication The bulk of the class focused on learning how to use green chemistry metrics and thereafter using those metrics to evaluate organic synthetic procedures. Other green chemistry courses that have been taught at other schools and published were very helpful in the process of designing effective modules that met the timeline and student learning objectives for our course.2 However, there was no one course that addressed all of the learning objectives we identified to include in our course. We wanted to give students the basic skills in evaluating greenness in the beginning of the semester; by the end of the semester, the students should be able to use all of these skills to not only evaluate greenness, but additionally discuss a solution for nongreen problems. Many of the published courses achieve their learning objectives through in-class discussion and exams. With an online format, we decided that weekly, self-paced assessments alongside discussion boards and a cumulative final project were more appropriate for the students to effectively evaluate greenness by the end of the semester. A more detailed list of how the module timeline was implemented is shown in Table 1.

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Videos

As discussed above, a fully online course can make a class feel less personal. To combat the feeling of being names without faces, some of the assignments required students to make and share a video of themselves. This tool was used mainly in the beginning of the semester to encourage students and instructors to get to know one another and to also help facilitate discussion of certain topics. For example, when learning about the 12 Principles of Green Chemistry, each student was assigned a principle and tasked with making a video presentation explaining that principle, along with including examples of where the principle is and is not followed. Each student was also required to watch one video of each of the remaining principles and comment about the content to promote discussion. In addition to encouraging students to get to know each other, these video assignments also provide students the unique opportunity to garner skills in presenting information in an online environment. Since many industries have collaborations nationally and internationally, this exercise gives students an example of what presenting information remotely is like, and gives them more confidence if they find themselves in a similar situation in the future. Video assignments were assessed on content relevant to the assignment and quality of video presentation. Written Assignments

The majority of the course assessments were written assignments. Students were asked to demonstrate their understanding of material and voice their opinions on a variety of topics. The format of written assignments varied: some were reflections or opinion pieces, some were summaries of journal articles, and in some the students were asked to identify compounds on food labels and summarize safety data sheets. Written assignments were mostly done individually and allowed instructors a way to differentiate the exceptional students. Because the nature of the assignments varied, assessment of writing assignments also varied. Points were usually awarded based on thoughtfulness, supportive arguments and opinions, and coherent summaries. Reading Assessments

TYPES OF ASSIGNMENT

Because most comprehensive textbooks for green chemistry are aimed to be used for introductory or nonmajor courses, there was no assigned textbook for the course. We decided to use a combination of textbooks, the current literature, and excerpts from books such as Deceit & Denial. To encourage engagement in the course and reading, whenever there was an assigned reading during a module, there was an assessment that went along with that reading. There was also a guided reading with open-ended questions to direct students to the main points of the reading. Assessments were typically multiple choice or fill-in quizzes, were timed at 1 h, and were submitted through the LMS.

Discussion Boards and Responses

As a consequence of this course being fully online, the traditional in-class discussion is eliminated. In order to incorporate valuable discussions between students, 8 discussion boards were used during the course of the semester. Discussion boards covered a range of topics, including discussion of green chemistry metrics, which were thereafter applied to the rest of the assignments. For example, students were given an assignment to determine the metric scores of a specific organic reaction and then charged with addressing which metrics they thought were most useful and why. D



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Group Work

students wanted to approach the whole synthesis, though, they were not penalized. Once students had an appropriate paper, they had 3 weeks to write a rough draft of their final project paper. For the content of the paper, students were to choose a metric to evaluate the synthesis in their chosen article, write a reflection on why they chose that metric, choose a process to make the reaction greener, explain why those choices would make the synthesis greener, reapply the same metric on the new synthesis, evaluate and reflect on the outcome, and compare the two processes. A rubric was provided to the students at the beginning of the semester so they could refer to it and put the appropriate weight of each part of the project into their paper. The rough draft was due in week 10. Once submissions for this draft were received, the instructors gave feedback and suggestions to students based off of the rubric. This feedback was given as soon as possible so the students had time to work on corrections and submit their final draft in week 14, which was their assignment in lieu of a final exam during exam week. To get a better idea of what was expected for students in this assignment, an example final project that received a high “A” is presented in the Supporting Information as well as the rubric.

One aspect of coursework that we wanted to include to try to prevent it from feeling impersonal was group work. Again, this is another opportunity for the instructors to introduce professional development into the course to get students used to communicating with each other remotely. Those working in industry, or any area for that matter, may not always have the convenience of meeting in-person, so it is important for students to learn these types of professional online communications. There is a Group tool in the LMS that we used that is useful for this assessment. Once the instructors had organized students into their Groups, the Group tool acted as a platform where students could virtually meet; upload files; communicate using blogs, discussion boards, or a group journal; create tasks for each other; and even send e-mails. This combines the various modes of communication one would use when working in a group, all in one place. However, if a Group tool is not available for other LMS platforms, other options are available, like Google Docs. This is especially true since in our case students chose to mostly use e-mail and Google Docs in order to facilitate working together. The groups were arranged in one module with the objective to complete a small task, in order for the group to get to know one another and learn how to best communicate between themselves. Once the students were familiar with their group, the next module introduced assessments, which included using metric calculations for a given reaction and then choosing an alternative method that they believe would make the reaction greener. To see if their alternative would green the reaction, those same metric calculations were done again. In addition, the group was responsible for writing a short paper discussing the outcomes of their calculations and why they chose the new methodology. This was assessed according to correct calculations of metrics, following directions, and adequate justification of the newly chosen metric. In order to make sure everyone contributed, each member was asked to individually write a short reflection on how well or poorly their group worked together. These reflections were also taken into consideration when grading the assignment. The group work assignments received the most negative feedback from students. From the comments that students provided about group work, this was mainly because it was difficult for some to figure out how to coordinate with their group members in addition to feeling like some group members worked harder than others.

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ASSESSMENT OF COURSE DESIGN

Undergraduate Student Perspective

In an online course, it can sometimes be difficult to gauge student reactions and responses to teaching styles or course material. It is important to know your audience and make adjustments when necessary. In order to gauge student attitudes and make adjustments, the instructors asked students to complete four feedback surveys at various times throughout the semester. These surveys were anonymous and for no credit. One source of inspiration for the course came from Kennedy’s publication on the green chemistry course taught at Westminister College in Pennsylvania.2a Accordingly, the first and last surveys were adapted from that course’s pre- and postsurveys. These surveys gave insight into the student perceptions and student abilities before and after the course. As the course progressed, we also wanted to know how the students were perceiving the content and format. The two surveys that assessed how the students perceived the content and format throughout the course were given as early-term and midterm feedback surveys. The goal of these surveys was to assess what the students liked and disliked about the organization of the course (i.e., module setup, types of assignments, frequency of assignments), to make modifications if something was unsuitable for the entire class. The students were asked which features of the course were most helpful, what changes the instructors (and students themselves) could make to enhance learning, and if the workload was appropriate. From the early-term feedback, given in week 4, the instructors learned that 62% of enrolled students had taken an online class before. The results of the survey suggested that the students most valued the video introductions for the current module and video recaps for the previous module provided by the instructors. However, many students disliked making their own videos because it made them self-conscious. The remaining assignments for the course did not involve the students making their own videos though, so adjusting for this negative feedback was not necessary on the instructors’ part. When asked about work load (compared with an in-person chemistry course), most students thought the workload was

Final Project

A final project was assigned instead of a final exam. This was worth 20% of the students’ final grade. In order to ensure students were working on the project as the course progressed, deadlines were set throughout the semester with goals for them to accomplish. The first step in submitting a successful final project was selecting an appropriate journal article that fit the requirements (published within the past 5 years and has a process that can be evaluated with the metrics we learned). To ensure that students received the proper guidance in this critical first step, they were required to choose an article by week seven. Instructors then read each submitted article and gave the students feedback on whether or not it was appropriate. Additionally, if students submitted an article with a multistep synthesis, a discussion was had on whether or not the student would be tackling all the steps or just one. For simplicity, students were encouraged to choose one step of a multistep synthesis that they felt needed the most work in “greening”. If E



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Figure 2. Distribution of student responses to pre- and postsurveys.

The final feedback survey was given in the last week of the semester and asked students some questions about the overall goals of the course. When asked if they would recommend the course to other students, every response was positive. Two of these responses typify students’ answers to the prompt: • “I would say yes because I got a lot of useful information out of the course that can realistically be applied to my career. In my opinion, many college courses do not apply real world situations well, but you both designed a course that truly can help many career fields.” • “Yes, this is a wonderful course to take for anyone who is pursuing a career in the chemical industry, pharmaceutical industry, or an environmentalist.” Along with the surveys, the university also asks students to fill out an evaluation of the course. The questions asked in this evaluation are similar to the questions that were asked in the final feedback survey, and therefore the answers were also similar. The question, “Based on your overall evaluation of the course and/or instructor, what specific suggestions do you wish to make for improvement?” received one of the most significant comments about a graduate student designed and taught course: “The only suggestion I can give is to keep the course around so it can continue to grow and develop. It has a strong foundation.” Only 37% (11 responses) of students filled out the

appropriate, with a number of students reporting that the workload was higher than anticipated. During week 10, the midterm feedback survey was given. This survey was used to more appropriately gauge what the students thought about the workload. Instructors wanted the student perspective to ensure the workload was not less stringent than other classes. As compared to an in-person class, the students overwhelmingly (67%) thought that the workload was commensurate, with 28% measuring it as more work and only 5% estimating less work than an in-person class. In contrast, of the students who had taken an online course in the past, 69% thought this class was more work than another online course, with the rest saying it was equal. While the course was being designed, it was decided that the course grades would depend on assignments, discussion board posts and responses, reading assessments, and the final project. Ultimately, we decided to not include exams in the course assessments; however, this was debated during initial course preparations. To gauge the student perspective, they were asked if they thought exams would be a beneficial addition to the course, since many in-person upper-level chemistry courses determine grades solely from exams. Through the responses, 68% of students said exams would not be beneficial, 14% said they would be beneficial, and 18% were indifferent. F



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While the pre- and postsurveys are informative for how the students perceived their abilities at the end of the course, it did not give information about whether or not the student learning objectives (SLOs) were met. As a way for the instructors to gauge whether or not the SLOs were obtained, the final project was evaluated. The final project was cumulative for the entire course, so the rubric that was developed for the final project was reflective of what the instructors wanted the students to learn. In general, students who received an A in the course met the SLOs. However, there were many students to receive As in the course, so for further iterations, the instructors recommend adding an additional section to the rubric to distinguish between excellent and outstanding students. However, it appears that most students were able to achieve the SLOs set out for the course.

course evaluation, but other responses for improvement included having no to little group work and to give more examples in introduction videos for assessments due that week. The group work response is expanded upon in a later section of this paper, but including more examples in introduction videos is also an amendment that will be made in future iterations of the course. This is especially true during the three metric modules, where several calculations are required to complete assignments. Pre-/Postsurvey Results

The first survey, a presurvey adapted from Kennedy, asked students to rank their agreement with 9 statements according to the Likert scale (Figure 2). In addition to ranking their agreement with the statements, the students were also asked to answer two questions that gauged their interest in the course as well as their working knowledge of green chemistry. One of those questions that was asked in the initial survey was “Why are you interested in taking this course?” Some of the most significant comments came from the answer to this question: • “I am a 5th year in chemical engineering. A big part of our job is to keep processes clean and efficient, especially with all of the push to go green in the workplace. I feel that this class is a perfect opportunity to get a jump on that movement.” • “There continues to be more and more emphasis placed on making chemical processes more green.” • “I also wish to gain a deeper understanding for potential career use.” • “The job I have after graduation will have a lot to do with reducing waste and being as environmentally responsible as possible.” • “I have taken chemistry all my life but I have never really thought about how chemistry needs to be economically and environmentally as friendly as possible.” These quotes directly support one of our initial desires to offer this course: to help students who will go on to industry be more marketable in having some background on green chemistry and how to use it. Additionally, this aspect of the survey allowed the instructors to get a sense of who was in the class and what prior knowledge existed. With respect to the statements with which the students were asked to either agree or disagree, the distributions of student responses are found in Figure 2 for the pre- and postsurveys. The statements are divided into two categories, the first four targeting the students’ perception and the last targeting their ability. The postsurvey (adapted from Kennedy) data show that the confidence of the majority of students greatly improved. Before taking the course, very few students strongly agreed with any of the statements, except item 4, which asks if the students understand the importance of all chemists practicing green chemistry. This strong agreement at the onset of the course is also reflected in many of the responses to why students were interested in taking the online class in the first place. Where there were several students who either disagreed or strongly disagreed with at least a few of the statements, these responses disappeared at the end of the course. However, it is important to note that responses to the postsurvey were fewer than the presurvey (of which all students participated), so it is possible that students who still would have disagreed or strongly disagreed chose instead to opt out of the survey. Overall, however, student confidence seems to have improved.

Future Changes

In order to improve upon the course in the future, students were also asked which modules were their favorite and least favorite. The response was that almost every topic covered was listed as a favorite: hazard identification assignment, history of green chemistry, disaster assignment, all metrics, reading assignments (specifically Deceit & Denial), outreach assignment, communication, video presentations, waste prevention, and the final project. On the other hand, the majority of students (>73%) said that either the life cycle analysis (LCA) assignment or the group work assignments were their least favorite. Unfortunately, these are two very important aspects integrated into the course and cannot simply be removed. To make adjustments for the next iteration of the course, the instructors have decided to make modifications to the LCA assignment in order to help clarify it, while still having it remain challenging. A recent publication outlines a way for students to more easily comprehend LCA through several discussion prompts based on actual LCA data.39 These prompts can be formatted to an in-person or online class, and can convey the importance of LCA without overwhelming the students. The group work should also not be removed from the course, but can be modified to help the students become accommodated to it in an online format. At the inception, the group work was identified as something necessary to incorporate in order to make the course feel less impersonal; additionally, it is a way for students to learn interpersonal skills remotely, which is most likely something that the students will do in their future careers. For this iteration of the course, group work was introduced late in the semester in the 11th week of class. Groups were made of either 5 or 6 students, and the same groups were carried into week 12 for another assignment. At this point in the semester, students already had clear patterns of when work would be completed, so the instructors have decided that in the next iteration, groups will be introduced earlier in the semester (same size groups as this was not an issue), specifically within the first month of the course. A demonstration of how to use the Group platform on our LMS will also be provided in the introduction video to the module, making it easier for students to begin communicating at the start of the module. It was also decided that for any group work in later modules, the groups will stay consistent. This way, students can become familiar with their groups early on and develop a rapport so when working together on more intensive assignments they have already developed a routine. Additionally, it will be made clear to the students why group work is being incorporated. Roberts and McInnerney cite that a clear G



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communication to students is a way to help minimize student apathy to group work in an online setting.40

be able to put their own unique touches on the course and learn their best teaching styles in the process. Further, green chemistry can be found in every subdiscipline of chemistry. By allowing graduate students who may not be exposed to green chemistry directly in their research laboratories to teach, they will now be up-to-date on green chemistry metrics, topics, and challenges in the field. Since these students are interested in pursuing an academic career, they can also take this information and experience to incorporate green chemistry into their future curriculum, which will help propel the Education Roadmap initiative that ACS has started.41

Graduate Student Reflection on Course Design

This experience has been invaluable to us, the graduate student designers of this course. The idea of designing an online green chemistry course started as an exercise that could help us obtain experience and skills in course development and instruction. Even if the course was not offered, we saw value in going through the necessary steps such as identifying learning outcomes, creating assessments, and becoming more familiar with learning management systems. However, the department also saw value in offering this course to undergraduates, so we continued our development, digging a little deeper into the focus of the course. We met biweekly to discuss best practices in course design and started to implement this into the design. We also took advantage of webinars, workshops, and experienced faculty to help us design our course. For advice on the online aspect, we had several meetings with the e-Center for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning staff. We discussed navigation of Blackboard (our LMS) as an instructor, best practices for managing online courses, making effective online assignments and quizzes, designing rubrics, and best ways to give feedback in an online environment. Finally, we also had representatives (Ringo and Hopgood) attend Undergraduate Curriculum Committee Meetings to better understand the process of offering a new class and then to advocate for our class to be offered. We even presented this course design at the 47th annual ACS Central Regional Meeting in Northern Kentucky, where we received constructive feedback from those who attended. Overall, this experience has been indispensable in facilitating productive networking and giving us confidence in describing to future employers how we would manage our own classes. So far, two of the graduate students have been able to use the content from this course design to teach two other in-person green chemistry courses at other institutions. A third graduate student has graduated since designing this course and will soon be using the skills she learned during this experience to move the general, organic, and biochemistry (GOB) course that she teaches at her current university online. Finally, another course designer is an international student, and she has expressed that the opportunity has allowed her to successfully navigate cultural boundaries and engage in the mass exploration of an international education system that was new to her. Additionally, it provided a thought process for her that resulted in the cultivation of a sustainable and greener approach to her doctoral work. Because we have had such a wonderful experience designing and teaching this course, we also wanted to allow future graduate students to have access to this opportunity. We have now created a peer-to-peer mentorship between graduate students who have previously taught the course and the graduate students who will teach the course the following academic year. There are now two new graduate students who were not involved in the course design, but who are both interested in an academic career, that will teach the course in Spring 2018. To prepare them for this, we have frequent meetings to discuss teaching strategies (especially in an online format), how we can improve the course, and opportunities to learn more about green chemistry, like attending the ACS Green Chemistry and Engineering Conference in the summer. While the new graduate students will not have quite the same opportunity by seeing the course from start to finish, they will

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CONCLUSIONS While several green chemistry courses have been developed and green chemistry topics incorporated into existing green chemistry curricula, this online course provides a unique platform for upper-level undergraduate students to delve into green chemistry topics. With a combination of diverse assessments, students displayed more confidence in identifying, understanding, and interpreting green chemistry related information. Professional development and the importance of being able to communicate effectively were also emphasized to the students. Finally, this is one of few courses designed, implemented, and taught by current graduate students. As the need for incorporating green chemistry into the curriculum rises, this may be a good strategy to incorporate into more graduate programs for graduate students interested in an academic career.

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ASSOCIATED CONTENT

* Supporting Information S

The Supporting Information is available on the ACS Publications website at DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.7b00730. Syllabus and schedule, pre- and postsurveys, selected rubrics, example reading quiz (with answers), example metrics assignment and communication assignments, example final project with a grade of high “A”, and screenshots of student view of course pages and modules (PDF, DOCX)

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AUTHOR INFORMATION

Corresponding Author

*E-mail: [email protected]. ORCID

Daniel C. Waddell: 0000-0001-7318-7687 Author Contributions †

R.A.H. and J.M.R. contributed equally.

Notes

The authors declare no competing financial interest.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The authors would like to thank Anna Gudmundsdottir, Bruce Ault, and the University of Cincinnati Chemistry Undergraduate Curriculum Committee for the opportunity to design and implement this course. We would additionally like to thank Joel Shulman for providing invaluable suggestions and comments, James Mack for his advice in Green Chemistry related topics, Josh Heinrich for his guidance in online course development, Mary Kirchhoff for inspiration and advice, and H



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Michael Cann for helpful discussions and providing Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award proposals.

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An Upper-Level Online Course for Undergraduates in Green

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