Undergraduates describe physiology course structure and weekly rhythms as aligning with Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and supporting transferable skills

STUDY OBJECTIVES include: (1) assessing the proportion of undergraduate physiology students who described aspects of course structure in an open-ended final course reflection, and (2) how students described the physiology course structure in relation to transferable skills. HYPOTHESIS: We predicted the majority of students would describe course structure in relation to UDL and transferable skills. METHODOLOGY & DATA: Of the 315 enrolled students, 295 students completed the final course reflection and 138 signed informed consent forms to allow their responses to be used for the study (n=138/295, 46.8% participation rate). Through qualitative content analysis, we developed an initial codebook, revised the codebook, and exceeded the 0.80 threshold for Inter-Rater Reliability (IRR) using Krippendorff's Alpha to establish the final codebook. To support data triangulation, we also used an AI-powered tool with commercial data protection to analyze student responses by copying about 30% of student responses (n=42/138) into Microsoft Copilot (UGA internal server) with prompts to develop themes and compare these themes to our final codebook. RESULTS: Through deductive coding of student responses, we constructed the following categories in our final codebook: (1) Weekly Classroom Assessment Techniques (Muddy Mondays, Working Wednesdays, Freaky Fridays) and (2) Additional Aspects of Course Structure, both in-class (e.g., Core Concepts, PLAs, Rainchecks) or outside of class (e.g., practice questions, supplemental videos). Preliminary results from a single coder show over 70% of students (n=102/138) described in detail how aspects of the course structure were useful for them in other contexts and supported their learning. Nearly 55% of students describe some aspect of UDL principles in their responses. To ensure scientific rigor and bias reduction, validation of the codebook is underway with two unbiased coders who achieved IRR, independently reviewed student responses, and are coding to consensus. CONCLUSIONS: Students overall show evidence of applying strategies from a single course to other courses to support study habits and collaborative learning. Our study offers a comprehensive overview of multiple components of course structure that students cite as supporting transferable skill development with implications for education researchers who assess and instructors who apply active learning strategies in instructional design for undergraduate physiology courses. This abstract was presented at the American Physiology Summit 2025 and is only available in HTML format. There is no downloadable file or PDF version. The Physiology editorial board was not involved in the peer review process.