Teaching Interventions: Our Successes in 2001

See Teaching Interventions Statistics

Major Findings Resulting from Teaching Interventions:

Interviews were conducted with the women in the intervention at the beginning of their class, and follow up interviews are being concluded now. We have also run a data set comparing grades, retention numbers, and other information about the women in the intervention to those of male and female students in regular Calculus I classes.

Prior to our intervention, the percentage of freshmen women at NIU continuing from Calculus I into Calculus II was about 30%. In Fall 2001, after we began our experimental grant, we were able to retain 82% of the freshmen women from our Calculus I intervention into Calculus II, and all the women made a C or better in Calculus I. Richard Blecksmith, the professor who taught the course, said he was surprised by the program's across-the-board success. "With every test I gave, the scores on average were 20 points higher than other semesters," he said. "I actually made the class much more rigorous than I usually do, almost to the level of an honors class. By the end, the students had a better grasp of some of the concepts than any class I've seen in a long time. . . . I've never had a calculus class outside of honors where everyone has passed the course with a C or better."

The women asked to stay together when they enrolled in Calculus II, and the assistant chair of the Department of Mathematical Sciences ensured that this could happen. The women who are now in Calculus II make up almost half their class (usually Calculus II classes include only one or two women, and they are unlikely to be freshmen). Moreover, the professor who taught the intervention section of Calculus I is teaching the women in Calculus II. So far, the students have taken one test. Most of the top grades on that test were from women in the FIG.

While the students have been in Calculus II, they have continued to meet with the doctoral student for mentoring and support. This weekly meeting also serves as a study group. We have invited other women from Calculus II to become involved, but thus far only the women from the FIG have been meeting. Several other study groups have formed as well. For example, one student who struggled to fit in and did not want to study with anyone else in the fall has now joined a study group. A Latina from a poor community, had always had to motivate herself because no one around her was academically successful. But in this case, her unwillingness to collaborate with others contributed to her receiving a C in Calculus I. This semester, she immediately joined a support/study group, and on the first test, she scored the highest of the women taking the class.

According to the literature, many women change their majors in such a way to avoid taking additional math classes, but none of the women in the FIG did so. Instead, two students who were undecided signed up to major in mathematics education. Two students also enrolled in fall Women's Studies classes, and one declared a Women's Studies minor (receiving extensive mentoring from the Director of Women's Studies), suggesting that the focus on women was also important in their success. The success of the support/study group indicates the importance of the women's commitment to helping the entire group succeed in mathematics. Another sign of how well this group has cohered is that the women have volunteered to attend orientation and admissions sessions for prospective Freshmen to encourage them to enroll in next year's intervention.

Nationally, about 20% of first-year women completing Calculus I take Calculus II. Yet 77% percent of the students in NIU's special Fall 2001 math section continued to take Calculus II. No one changed her major in such a way to avoid taking additional math classes, and in fact, several students signed up for majors in mathematics.