"Student Engagement, Learning, and Retention in a Freshman, Large Class Setting at the University of Arizona"

This paper describes a new approach to teaching a large lecture C Programming class (ECE175) in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at the University of Arizona.The approach demonstrates a method of increasing student engagement, student learning and student retention by using Undergraduate Laboratory Assistants (ULAs) in conjunction with Graduate Teaching Assistants (TAs) in a laboratory environment.The class typically has an enrollment of 175 to 230 students per semester and is a service course for students outside of the major, in addition to ECE majors.In the past, the class had an optional attendance laboratory component, staffed by several TA's, who offered homework assistance to students.In the revised course structure, the laboratory component has been transformed to a mandatory attendance recitation/activity/grading 3-hour lab, with 5 sections of up to 49 students each.The lab space is equipped with 49 workstations, all linked to a single computer controlled by the instructor.Each lab section is staffed by at least two TAs and 4 to 8 ULAs, depending on the lab enrollment.Prior to attending the lab, students submit their weekly homework assignment on the DesireToLearn (D2L) online submission system.Weekly homework consists of one to three programming problems related to the main lecture material and a series of multiple-choice, true/false, and short "human-compiled" code questions taken from the online interactive course textbook.In the lab, each individual student is graded by a ULA for a period of 15 minutes on his prior HW submission.Grading is based on a rubric designed to test a) the completeness, correctness, and code efficiency and b) the student's conceptual understanding on the code that he/she developed and related software engineering concepts.The lab also consists of one or two additional programming assignments, which must be completed within the remaining lab time.Initial experiences with the revised course structure indicate that the lab portion has improved student engagement, learning, and retention.Statistical analysis from the online textbook, which has a series of computer graded exercises, final grades, and number of drops per class are used to evaluate whether student learning and retention has been increased.