Student performance and perception on a lab practicum assessment in a reformed introductory physics lab

A growing body of research on laboratory classes has encouraged a shift away from traditional, cook-book, content-validation activities and towards more authentic, inquiry-based explorations.Over the last several years we have reformed our Introductory Experimental Physics course based on this call.Despite positive responses from students and the instructional team, a consistent issue was the authentic, individual assessment of experimental content knowledge and practical laboratory skills.This paper discusses the goals and structure of a new laboratory practicum assessment, and reports on student performance and reception of the assessment over two semesters of data collection.Results show that student performance is stable over two semesters, and that students broadly feel that the practicum is a fair and accurate assessment of their performance in lab.Differences between the two courses (Lab 1 and Lab 2) and between the two semesters of data collection are explored in detail.