title: What's in a Prerequisite? A Mixed-Methods Approach to Identifying the Impact of a Prerequisite Course.
abstract: Despite the ubiquity of prerequisites in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics curricula, there has been minimal effort to assess their value in a data-driven manner. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, we examined the impact of prerequisites in the context of a microbiology lecture and lab course pairing. Through interviews and an online survey, students highlighted a number of positive attributes of prerequisites, including their role in knowledge acquisition, along with negative impacts, such as perhaps needlessly increasing time to degree and adding to the cost of education. We also identified a number of reasons why individuals do or do not enroll in prerequisite courses, many of which were not related to student learning. In our particular curriculum, students did not believe the microbiology lecture course impacted success in the lab, which agrees with our analysis of lab course performance using a previously established "familiarity" scale. These conclusions highlight the importance of soliciting and analyzing student feedback, and triangulating these data with quantitative performance metrics to assess the state of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics curricula.
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697 bsato@uci.edu.
authors.forename: Brian K
authors.initials: BK
authors.lastname: Sato
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697.
authors.forename: Amanda K
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697.
authors.forename: Usman
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Alam
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697.
authors.forename: Jennifer V
authors.initials: JV
authors.lastname: Dang
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697.
authors.forename: Samantha J
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Dacanay
authors.affiliation: Division of Infectious Diseases, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA 94305.
authors.forename: Pedro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Morgado
authors.affiliation: Division of Biological Sciences, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093.
authors.forename: Giorgia
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Pirino
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, California State University, Long Beach, Long Beach, CA 90840.
authors.forename: Jo Ellen
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Brunner
authors.affiliation: School of Education, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697.
authors.forename: Leanne A
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: Castillo
authors.affiliation: School of Education, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697.
authors.forename: Valerie W
authors.initials: VW
authors.lastname: Chan
authors.affiliation: School of Education, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697.
authors.forename: Judith H
authors.initials: JH
authors.lastname: Sandholtz
mesh_terms: D000124:Achievement; D003479:Curriculum / Q000592:standards*; D004521:Educational Measurement / Q000379:methods*; D004738:Engineering; D006801:Humans; D008433:Mathematics; D018794:Problem-Based Learning; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology*