University of California Riverside – Campus Wide Solution Brief

University of California Riverside – Campus Wide Solution Brief

University of California Riverside (UCR) has been working with Student Response Systems since 2004 when Psychology department faculty member Michael Erickson and UCR’s Computing & Communications Manager Dr. Leo Schouest launched their first successful pilot. Dr. Schouest and his team have now fully implemented the H-ITT Campus Wide Student Response solution. UCR has approximately 85 classrooms equipped with student response and 8500 students using the devices across campus. Several departments at UCR have embraced the technology including, Psychology, Physics, Computer Science, Chemistry, Statistics, Biology, Sociology, Mathematics and Engineering.

Why Use Student

To create a more active and participative learning environment, especially in large classrooms. Clickers enable students in every size class to participate by expressing their opinion or demonstrating their understanding of the subject matter.
To quickly and efficiently quiz students on their knowledge of the material delivered via lecture or from reading assignments.
To routinely take class attendance, especially in large classrooms where “manual” attendance taking is not practical.
To make lectures more fun! The common theme through UCR’s four quarter Clicker pilot was that students genuinely enjoyed the interaction brought about by use of the Clickers in their class.
To enhance retention. More interactivity leads to better retention.
To assist in making decisions on when to modify lecture material based on gaining a better understanding of what students are “getting” and what they aren’t.

“ It really does break up some of the lecture – it does energize the audience - the students learn better when there is some level of emotional arousal - the higher the energy, the greater the learning. These devices do seem to have that kind of positive effect on the energy of the room. The biggest problem you have is calming them down after having used the device, which is a greater problem than having to get them to pay attention”.

Robert Hanneman, Professor of Sociology

Campus Wide Student Response Benefits

UCR’s benefits gained from leveraging a campus wide standard for their student response system are as follows:

Create Engage Classroom environments to enhance the Students and Instructors educational experience.
Reduced cost for Students – No need to for Students to purchase multiple response devices.
Reduced support requirement for the UCR – Only need to support one solution across the entire campus.
Leverage improved functionality and Student Response solution benefits – By selecting one platform UCR is able to leverage best practices across more users. Students are able to spread the cost of a single device across more classes.

For additional information please visit UCR’s Clicker website at: http://cnc.ucr.edu/clickers/