Introduction
Many articles have addressed writing assignments for
students in chemistry courses [1]. The most recent
articles report assignments that reinforce concepts [2–5], connect chemistry
with daily life [6–8], or expose students to literature [9, 10]. Few papers
address having undergraduates write research proposals [11, 12].
Successful professionals must be
able to write well, develop good ideas that are supported with evidence, and
explain systems. Proposal writing is important for chemical
professionals because of the need to accrue funding for equipment and research
supplies, whether internally or externally [13]. With
the increasing public pressure to justify scientific and medical
expenditures, government and other granting agencies are funding those
proposals that do the best job of explaining the relevance of the research.
Graduate programs continue to value proposal writing experience and it remains
a graduation requirement at some universities [14].
The explosion of scientific, and
particularly biotechnological, information has brought with it the
coverage-versus-depth issue. Scientists typically choose coverage because of
the formidable entrance exams (MCAT, subject GRE) and the fact that knowledge
is cumulative in the sciences. I believe we undervalue the student learning
that can come from direct engagement with one issue. The nature of this
assignment forces students to delve into a topic in biochemistry that intrigues
them. Because of the individualistic nature of this assignment, most of the
work involved takes place outside of class time and is student-driven.
Proposal writing challenges students and
faculty members. The use of this assignment in class generates meaningful
discussions about the breadth of biochemistry and brings current issues to the
forefront. I use this assignment as an addition to the traditional material
covered in a biochemistry course populated by biology, preprofessional (e.g.,
premedical, preveterinary), and chemistry majors. Assisting approximately 30
first-semester biochemistry students and evaluating their proposals increase my
skills and validate ongoing involvement with the biochemical literature.
The Assignment
The ultimate goal of this assignment is to
have students write a five- to seven-page research proposal, beginning from the
primary literature. Students are not required to carry out or be able to
complete the work they propose, nor are they required to elaborate on
experimental details in the proposal. It is very important that students
identify the importance of the work, justify their idea, and utilize the primary
literature. Students are given a sample proposal, format guidelines, and
grading criteria for this assignment.
Purpose of a Series of Assignments
The task of writing a five- to seven-page
proposal including embedded figures and/or equations is formidable for
undergraduates. In order to use this exercise as a meaningful learning
experience, it needed to simulate all the parts of the proposal writing
process. I segmented the process into a series of assignments: topic idea,
rough draft, peer review, and final draft. Each assignment had a deadline, with
the whole process extending over approximately eight weeks of the semester
(Table 1). By segmenting the project, I
allowed for multiple opportunities to provide feedback and to redirect students
if necessary.
Topic Idea
Most students have read some primary chemical or
biological literature by the time they are college juniors. However, I do not
assume that they understand how to utilize the literature to generate an idea.
We discuss resources in class such as faculty consultations, interlibrary loan,
MedLine, research libraries, reference librarians, and the Writing Center
staff. During one class period each student finds examples of peer-reviewed
articles, editorials or commentaries, and news articles in a variety of
journals. We discuss the values and pitfalls of different resources and article
types.
I also talk about the process of searching for knowledge
gaps when you are a newcomer to a field. I tell them to discuss topics and
ideas with everyone, scan journals, and to work on multiple ideas
simultaneously. It is not unusual for students to spend a considerable amount
of time investigating a preliminary topic only to find that they have no ideas
in this area. I have found that I can reduce their stress by steering them away
from topics that are highly evolved and by giving an estimate of the reduction
from interesting topics (~100) to preliminary ideas (~10) to final ideas (1–2).
Table 1.
Timetable Based on a Sixteen-Week Semester
|
Assignment
|
Semester Week
|
Class time used
(in days)
|
|
Details of the
assignment and strategies for using the literature for idea development.
|
1–2
|
1–2
|
|
Idea due date.
|
4–6
|
0
|
|
Rough draft due date and peer review.
|
8–10
|
1
|
|
Final draft
due date.
|
10–12
|
0
|
Student-generated ideas do not have to take into account
resource limitations at our university. Ideally their idea should be developed
so that the basic technique and/or experimental design is outlined. The answer
to their research idea must not be in the literature, but journal articles must
provide precedents for the experiment(s) they outline. Ten references, with a
minimum of five peer-reviewed articles, are adequate for quickly assessing
precedents when article titles are provided.
Students typically turn in viable, albeit not
well-defined, short passages about their idea(s) for me to comment on. Their
goal is to sell a topic to me, as they might with a preliminary proposal to a
research supervisor or funding agency. Since the process is evaluated at such
an early stage, students are encouraged to seek information and get assistance
in generating additional, more concrete ideas. I use the idea checkpoint as a
way to provide resources, ask leading questions, and direct students to the
most interesting ideas possible.
Rough Draft
The reality of writing is that one must allow time for
revisions. This is also true of the proposal writing process. Students are good
at putting papers aside until just before the deadline and they do not take
revisions seriously. By having a rough-draft deadline, students realized that
there was an opportunity to get an idea of how much more they need to work on
their paper.
I encourage students to take the rough draft seriously.
They are reminded that both the draft and final copy must be turned in to receive
a grade for the paper. The rough draft is what their classmates will review. I
supply an “estimated grade” to the draft that is predictive of what the paper
would earn if it were their final draft. This estimated grade is not recorded,
but allows me to gauge the current status of the papers and encourages
meaningful revision. I am particularly critical of references and the
concreteness of their research idea, although I do not neglect errors that
detract from the clarity of the paper. Students value the comments made on
their rough drafts more seriously than on papers where I allow rewrites after a
grade has been assigned.
The closer the draft version of the paper is
to the final draft, the closer the estimated grade is to the final grade. Since
students are required to turn in rough drafts along with their final draft,
adequate revisions automatically result in a one-letter-grade improvement.
Obviously, students who do a good job on the rough draft have less work to do
toward the end of the semester.
Peer Review
The peer review process is how scientific proposals are
commonly evaluated. During one class period students read and critique proposal
drafts by several classmates. Written student comments on peer work are made on
separate forms. The forms request information about ease in understanding, the
value of the idea, writing, and the assignment of a grade. After reviewing two
to four other student papers, the review forms are collected.
Student comments are utilized informally as I
write comments on each draft. I strategically select the most useful student
comments and incorporate peer-derived information in my critique. This keeps
the reviewer’s comments anonymous, an important fact since many reviewers are
too lenient or too harsh. I do not want to send student writers mixed messages
or to discourage them.
Final Draft
The final draft is submitted with the rough
draft that students utilized for revision purposes. By having spent the bulk of
the grading time on a rough draft, grading the final draft is much quicker. I
check to see that the comments on the rough draft have been addressed. The
estimated grade gives me an idea of where the paper began. Some students make
tremendous improvements in their papers and the grades go up accordingly. Final
drafts are the culmination of the student writing experience and strongly
resemble short proposals to a funding agency.
Grading Criteria
These exercises are important, require serious self-study,
and are difficult for undergraduates. Therefore it is important that this
experience has a high grading value. It is not unusual for this to be a
significant component of the total points possible in the course. I have given
this assignment as much as one quarter of the final grade, although it takes
only 2–3 class periods.
Approximately half of the points result from
participation in the process; the remaining points are used to evaluate the
final product. The idea, rough-draft, and peer review points are assigned based
on meeting the deadlines and giving meaningful feedback to classmates. If one
of these items is late or of very poor quality, a penalty is applied. The
estimated grade assigned to each rough draft is based upon scientific content,
originality, references, and the clarity of writing. I estimate low to encourage
the revision process and significantly improve the overall quality of the final
product. It is not unusual for me to estimate drafts at the D and F levels if
they do not present a research idea. I have found that the lower the estimated
grade, the harder students work to improve and the more apt they are to earn
several letter grades higher. Final drafts are evaluated on the same criteria
as rough drafts, with an automatic one-letter-grade improvement from the
estimated grade. This improvement is to reward rewriting and revising the
draft, a task students abhor.
Implementation Issues
Millikin University does not have a biochemistry major,
although we do offer one year of biochemistry, one semester of biochemistry
laboratory, and a chemistry major biochemistry emphasis. The first-semester
class size is typically thirty students; ten or fewer students take
second-semester biochemistry. This assignment takes the maximum number of our
students to the next level of critical thinking and writing.
I use this assignment in my first-semester
biochemistry course instead of grading homework sets. All Millikin junior and
senior biology and chemistry majors have taken an introductory course in
research methods. Some students have familiarity with the primary literature
and some are engaged in undergraduate research projects. Our students are
incredibly self-motivated when allowed to select their own topics; reducing
student topic options, however, may be a useful strategy for larger enrollments
or to facilitate the use of graders. The average time taken to grade each idea,
rough draft, and final paper is an hour per student, which is half the time
typical of reviewing a proposal for a funding agency.
Outcomes
I have not been disappointed with this process or the outcomes.
Students have written about a wide variety of biochemical topics (Table 2). They gain basic skills in proposal writing as well
as an appreciation for their topic. Students enjoy becoming experts and they
like sharing their ideas with scientifically literate peers. Even students who
struggle through the initial steps of idea formulation and rough-draft writing
turn in surprisingly good final drafts. The knowledge base of biochemistry
changes so rapidly that information is quickly usurped by new studies, so
plagiarism is not common.
Students who have gone on to graduate school or to
interview for jobs are especially appreciative. They write back to say that
because of their experience, they were able to discuss a biochemical topic in
depth, talk about the proposal writing process from experience, and/or write a
proposal of their own. I have also had students say they felt it was an
important advantage in graduate school.
An added benefit of this assignment is the
stimulation it provides me as a biochemist and instructor. I am always
impressed and challenged with the diversity of topics that students select.
Assisting students and evaluating their proposals force me to stay current with
the literature. Their idea papers further my understanding of what students are
interested in. I find it extremely invigorating to read the final products that
students submit. It is equally heartening to see how undergraduates can delve
into the primary literature, critically examine an issue, and develop a
biochemical idea.
References
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3.
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4.
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5.
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6.
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7.
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The
Chemical Educator, Vol. 5, No. 3,
S1430-4171(99)04314-8, 10.1007/s00897990314a, © 2000 Springer-Verlag New York,
Inc.