Primary Investigators: Clay Shields & Marcus Maloof

Computer Science I is the first exposure students get to our discipline. They need to master the new skill of translating problems into algorithms suitable for computation and the operation of programming tools and the idiosyncrasies of the C++ language, including how to write code that is easily understandable by others. It is as if students learning history had to learn English syntax and the operation of a word processor in order to write a paper. Our approach to helping students succeed has been for the professor and undergraduate teaching assistants to spend significant amounts of time with each student on tutoring and providing individual feedback on their work. While this has proven successful, it doesn’t scale well. Given the significant increase in enrollment, we have had to rethink some of our approaches. As part of our ITEL project, we are going to be using Lecture Capture, Peer-review software to enhance the use of class time and provide more informed feedback to students.