Education Commons^™

Virtual Engineering Sciences Learning Lab: Giving Stem Education A Second Life, Stephanie E. August, Michele L. Hammers, Don Brian Murphy, Allison Neyer, Penda Gueye, Robert Q. Thames

Computer Science Faculty Works

Engineering education in the 21st century faces multiple obstacles including limited accessibility of course resources due, in part, to the costs associated with acquiring and maintaining equipment and staffing laboratories. Another continuing challenge is the low level of participation of women and other groups historically underrepresented in STEM disciplines. As a partial remedy for these issues, we established a Virtual Engineering Sciences Learning Lab (VESLL) that provides interactive objects and learning activities, multimedia displays, and instant feedback procedures in a virtual environment to guide students through a series of key quantitative skills and concepts. Developed in the online virtual world …

Increasing Retention In Stem: Results From A Stem Talent Expansion Program At The University Of Memphis, Alistair Windsor, Anna E. Bargagliotti, Rachel Best, Donald Franceschetti, John Haddock, Stephanie Ivey, David Russomanno

Mathematics Faculty Works

MemphiSTEP is a five-year STEM Talent Expansion Program at the University of Memphis sponsored by the National Science Foundation. The project focuses on retention and persistence to graduation to increase the number of STEM majors and graduates. The project includes a range of student retention programs, including a Summer Mathematics Bridge Bootcamp, Networking Program, Research Award Program, Travel Award program and STEM Learning Communities; Results from the first four years of the project suggest that MemphiSTEP is making a positive impact on student retention and performance in STEM fields. Our data indicate that even after controlling for gender, race, and …

La Diversidad De Los Análisis De Diversidad La Diversidad De Los Analisis De Diversidad [The Diversity Of Diversity Analyses], Victor D. Carmona-Galindo, Tizziana V. Carmona

Biology Faculty Works

There is a lack of consistency with respect to the use of the terms like species richness, diversity and biodiversity, which extends to the analysis of diversity indices and the merit of using diversity indices in the evaluation (comparison and contrast) of biological communities. The purpose of this article is to provide working definitions for these terms and cite examples from the primary literature that demonstrate the utility of estimating richness, evaluating proportional abundance patterns, as well as comparing indices of diversity and similarity to study patterns of biological organization at different ecological scales. Additionally, we provide a manual in …

The Effectiveness Of Blended Instruction In Core Postsecondary Mathematics Courses, Anna E. Bargagliotti, Fernanda Botelho, Jim Gleason, John Haddock, Alistair Windsor

Mathematics Faculty Works

Most students in U.S. universities are required to take a collection of core courses regardless of their degree or major. These courses are known as "general education" courses. The general education requirements typically include at least one mathematics course. Unfortunately each year hundreds of thousands of students in the US do not succeed in these general education mathematics courses causing them to act as a barrier to degree completion. Low student success rates in these courses are pervasive, and it is well documented that the U.S. needs to improve student success and retention in general education mathematics courses.

In this …

Intonation And Compensation Of Fretted String Instruments, Gabriele U. Varieschi, Christina M. Gower

Physics Faculty Works

We discuss theoretical and physical models that are useful for analyzing the intonation of musical instruments such as guitars and mandolins and can be used to improve the tuning on these instruments. The placement of frets on the fingerboard is designed according to mathematical rules and the assumption of an ideal string. The analysis becomes more complicated when we include the effects of deformation of the string and inharmonicity due to other string characteristics. As a consequence, perfect intonation of all the notes on the instrument cannot be achieved, but complex compensation procedures can be introduced to minimize the problem. …

Toy Blocks And Rotational Physics, Gabriele U. Varieschi, Isabel R. Jully

Physics Faculty Works

Have you ever observed a child playing with toy blocks? A favorite game is to build towers and then make them topple like falling trees. To the eye of a trained physicist this should immediately look like an example of the physics of “falling chimneys,” when tall structures bend and break in mid-air while falling to the ground. The game played with toy blocks can actually reproduce well what is usually seen in photographs of falling towers, such as the one that appeared on the cover of the September 1976 issue of The Physics Teacher.1 In this paper we describe …

Toy Models For The Falling Chimney, Gabriele U. Varieschi, Kaoru Kamiya

Physics Faculty Works

In this paper we review the theory of the ‘‘falling chimney,’’ which deals with the breaking in mid-air of tall structures when they fall to the ground. We show that these ruptures can be caused by either shear forces typically developing near the base, or by the bending of the structure which is caused primarily by the internal bending moment. In the latter case the breaking is more likely to occur between one-third and one-half of the height of the chimney. Small scale toy models are used to reproduce the dynamics of the falling chimney. By examining photos taken during …