Survey background

Project title: Identifying Student beliefs about Chemistry and Learning Chemistry in a second-year service chemistry course.

Names of Researchers: Dr David Salter, Dr Cather Simpson and Dr Malini Arewgoda

These researchers are academic members of the Department of Chemistry and also the teaching staff for CHEM 243. The purpose of this survey is to gather information about students’ beliefs about learning chemistry. Identifying any relationships between students' beliefs about chemistry and their success in a chemistry course will inform us about how to design the CHEM 243 course more effectively. Knowing whether students’ beliefs about chemistry change or remain the same as they progress through this course helps us improve our teaching practices. You are being asked to respond to this survey at your convenience. Participation is entirely voluntary but as much information as possible that is collected will greatly assist us in determining how to provide a better learning environment for students enrolled in this course. The survey will take about 10 minutes of your time. You might be asked to complete this survey again, at the end of the semester. We are asking that you express your own beliefs. The HOD Chemistry has provided assurance that your participation or non-participation will NOT affect your grade nor will any academic relationships with members of staff be affected by either refusal or agreement to participate.

Although you are required to use your UPI for login, the Bestchoice system assigns each participant a random number in order to preserve the anonymity of participants. The researchers will not have access to any list showing individual survey responses together with the corresponding UPI. The responses to this survey are therefore anonymous to the researchers. Knowledge of the number that is assigned to each UPI will be limited to the Bestchoice system administrator who is not involved in teaching any part of the CHEM 243 course.

Reponses will be stored electronically on the secure University of Auckland server that hosts the Bestchoice website. Data from individual responses will not be retained beyond the completion of this research project. Below are a number of statements that may or may not describe your beliefs about learning chemistry.

Select a number between 1 and 5 that best expresses your feeling about the statement where the number 1 indicates Strongly Disagree and number 5 indicates Strongly Agree. If you don't understand a statement, leave it blank.

Your agreement to participate is indicated by completing and submitting this survey. Once responses have been submitted, participation cannot be withdrawn. Your signature is not required on any document.

The following researchers are carrying out this research project:
Dr David Salter, Department of Chemistry,
The University of Auckland
Email: d.salter@auckland.ac.nz;
Phone (09) 923 4957

Dr Cather Simpson, Department of Chemistry,
The University of Auckland
Email: c.simpson@auckland.ac.nz;
Phone (09) 923 3525

Dr Malini Arewgoda,
Department of Chemistry
The University of Auckland
Email: c.arewgoda@auckland.ac.nz;
Phone (09) 923 7318

The Head of the Department of Chemistry is: Prof Jim Metson, Department of Chemistry, The University of Auckland Email: j.metson@auckland.ac.nz; Phone (09) 923 3877

For any queries regarding ethical concerns you may contact the Chair,
The University of Auckland Human Participants Ethics Committee,
The University of Auckland,
Office of the Vice Chancellor,
Private Bag 92019, Auckland 1142.
Telephone 09 373-7599 extn. 83711.

APPROVED BY THE UNIVERSITY OF AUCKLAND HUMAN PARTICIPANTS ETHICS COMMITTEE ON 17 March 2010 for three years, Reference Number 2010/104