Howick, Lester C.

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Journal of the Arkansas Academy of ScienceVolume 20 Article 211966Undergraduate Curriculum in ChemistryLester C. HowickUniversity of Arkansas, FayettevilleFollow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.uark.edu/jaasPart of the Curriculum and Instruction Commons, and the Science and Mathematics EducationCommonsThis article is available for use under the Creative Commons license: Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0). Users are able toread, download, copy, print, distribute, search, link to the full texts of these articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking priorpermission from the publisher or the author.This Article is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UARK. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of the Arkansas Academyof Science by an authorized editor of ScholarWorks@UARK. For more information, please contact scholar@uark.edu, ccmiddle@uark.edu.Recommended CitationHowick, Lester C. (1966) "Undergraduate Curriculum in Chemistry," Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science: Vol. 20 , Article 21.Available at: http://scholarworks.uark.edu/jaas/vol20/iss1/21122Arkansas Academy of Science Proceedings, Vol. 20, 1966THE UNDERGRADUATE CURRICULUM IN CHEMISTRYLester C. HowickUniversity of ArkansasUntil very recently the undergraduate curriculum in sciences wasquite uniform from college to college and was quite stable with respectto time. Currently these curricula are receiving a great deal of attention.This interest is stimulated not only by the rapidly growing enrollmentbut also by a variety of other factors. One of these is the rapiddevelopments being made in the sciences today. The amount of time,energy and money being spent on scientific research is greater thanever before in the history of man and new knowledge is being devel-oped at an unprecedented rate. Another factor is the recent improve-ment in high school training in the sciences and mathematics. Withinthe past decade there has been a tremendous effort by the high schoolsin Arkansas to improve and update their science offerings with theresult that the colleges now bear the responsibility for providing thestudents with a challenging and rewarding program which utilizes thispreparation. Finally, graduate schools and employers have come toexpect a much higher level of training than was previously possessedby the graduating senior.We who are engaged in college level teaching in Arkansas areparticularly affected by the changes made elsewhere in Chemistry cur-ricula. It is no longer true, if it ever was, that our students must meetthe educational level of the surrounding geographical area. In thisage of increased citizen mobility our students must be prepared tocompete with graduates from any state in the union. When they applyfor a job or a graduate position they are compared with all possiblecandidates regardless of geographical areas of origin. If we fail toprepare these young people for this competition then we have failedin our primary responsibilities as teachers.Thus, our goal is before us but it is a goal that is rapidly movingforward. In a recent article (1) Professor Robert I. Walker reports thatover sixty percent of the institutions in the United States which grantBachelor's degrees with a major in chemistry have revised their coursesequences with accompanying changes in course content during the pastfive years. A series of articles (2-4) in the March issue of the Journalof Chemical Education reports on a special symposium held at theAmerican Chemical Society national meeting in Atlantic City entitled"The Changing Chemistry Curriculum." From these articles and fromother publications and papers presented at meetings one is led to theconclusion that any curriculum which has not undergone significantmodification since 1960 is probably out of touch with modern advancesin chemical knowledge and that students passing through these programswill probably be greatly handicapped at the end of their undergrad-uate training.In an attempt to better prepare our students for this competition, theUniversity of Arkansas instituted in the fall of 1965 a new curriculum122Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 20 [1966], Art. 21Published by Arkansas Academy of Science, 1966123Undergraduate (Curriculum in Chemistryleading to the B.S. degree in chemistry. This program is specificallydesigned for the well qualified entering student. Itrecognizes his back-ground by encouraging him to complete the elementary material throughphysical chemistry as rapidly as possible so as to proceed to courses ofgreater content. The science and mathematics portions of this programand the semester hours credit for each are shown in the following table.University of ArkansasB. S. Chemistry' CurriculumFall Semester Spring Semester1st Year5 General Chemistry 4 Analytical Chemistry I5 Calculus I 5 Calculus II4 Biology 4 Biology2nd Year4 Organic Chemistry 5 Organic Chemistry4 Physics 4 Physics3 Calculus III3rd Year4 Physical Chemistry 6 Physical Chemistry4 Analytical Chemistry II4th Year2 Modern Organic Analysis Research3 Advanced Inorganic3 Elective Advanced Chemistry LectureResearchMinimum Total Hours:40 Chemistry136 All courses.While strongly believing that this course sequence is well designed toprepare the qualified student for graduate work or industrial employ-ment we also recognize that not all of the high schools are giving thislevel of preparation and alternative sequences are available whichbegin at a lower level but sacrifice flexibility in the final year to stillachieve the same coverage.Finally, it should be strongly emphasized that a simple list of suchcourses does not adequately reflect the greatest changes which aretaking place. These are changes in the content of the individual courses.In many cases while the titles employed are the classical titles, thecourses themselves bear little resemblance to those taught only tenyears ago. In this respect even the most current of textbooks are tooold for they are outdated before they see print and a great responsibilityresolves upon the teaching faculty for the rapid and effective incorpora-tion of current developments into the ever changing undergraduate cur-riculum.123Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 20 [1966], Art. 21http://scholarworks.uark.edu/jaas/vol20/iss1/21124Arkansas Academy of Science ProceedingsLITERATURE CITED1. Robert I. Walter, J. Chem. Ed. 42, 524-528 (1965).2. John Ross, J. Chem. Ed. 43, 112-115(1 966).3. Robert B. Whitney, J. Chem. Ed. 43, 116-117 (1966).4. Arthur E. Martell, J. Chem. Ed. 43, 117-120 (1966).124Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 20 [1966], Art. 21Published by Arkansas Academy of Science, 1966

Undergraduate Curriculum in Chemistry

UARK (University of Arkansas )

Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science Volume 20 Article 21 1966 Undergraduate Curriculum in Chemistry Lester C. Howick University of Arkansas, Fayetteville Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.uark.edu/jaas  Part of the Curriculum and Instruction Commons, and the Science and Mathematics Education Commons Recommended Citation Howick, Lester C. (1966) "Undergraduate Curriculum in Chemistry," Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science: Vol. 20 , Article 21. Available at: https://scholarworks.uark.edu/jaas/vol20/iss1/21 This article is available for use under the Creative Commons license: Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0). Users are able to read, download, copy, print, distribute, search, link to the full texts of these articles, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UARK. It has been accepted for inclusion in Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science by an authorized editor of ScholarWorks@UARK. For more information, please contact scholar@uark.edu. 122Arkansas Academy of Science Proceedings, Vol. 20, 1966THE UNDERGRADUATE CURRICULUM IN CHEMISTRYLester C. HowickUniversity of ArkansasUntil very recently the undergraduate curriculum in sciences wasquite uniform from college to college and was quite stable with respectto time. Currently these curricula are receiving a great deal of attention.This interest is stimulated not only by the rapidly growing enrollmentbut also by a variety of other factors. One of these is the rapiddevelopments being made in the sciences today. The amount of time,energy and money being spent on scientific research is greater thanever before in the history of man and new knowledge is being devel-oped at an unprecedented rate. Another factor is the recent improve-ment in high school training in the sciences and mathematics. Withinthe past decade there has been a tremendous effort by the high schoolsin Arkansas to improve and update their science offerings with theresult that the colleges now bear the responsibility for providing thestudents with a challenging and rewarding program which utilizes thispreparation. Finally, graduate schools and employers have come toexpect a much higher level of training than was previously possessedby the graduating senior.We who are engaged in college level teaching in Arkansas areparticularly affected by the changes made elsewhere in Chemistry cur-ricula. It is no longer true, if it ever was, that our students must meetthe educational level of the surrounding geographical area. In thisage of increased citizen mobility our students must be prepared tocompete with graduates from any state in the union. When they applyfor a job or a graduate position they are compared with all possiblecandidates regardless of geographical areas of origin. If we fail toprepare these young people for this competition then we have failedin our primary responsibilities as teachers.Thus, our goal is before us but it is a goal that is rapidly movingforward. In a recent article (1) Professor Robert I. Walker reports thatover sixty percent of the institutions in the United States which grantBachelor's degrees with a major in chemistry have revised their coursesequences with accompanying changes in course content during the pastfive years. A series of articles (2-4) in the March issue of the Journalof Chemical Education reports on a special symposium held at theAmerican Chemical Society national meeting in Atlantic City entitled"The Changing Chemistry Curriculum." From these articles and fromother publications and papers presented at meetings one is led to theconclusion that any curriculum which has not undergone significantmodification since 1960 is probably out of touch with modern advancesin chemical knowledge and that students passing through these programswill probably be greatly handicapped at the end of their undergrad-uate training.In an attempt to better prepare our students for this competition, theUniversity of Arkansas instituted in the fall of 1965 a new curriculum122Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 20 [1966], Art. 21Published by Arkansas Academy of Science, 1966123Undergraduate (Curriculum in Chemistryleading to the B.S. degree in chemistry. This program is specificallydesigned for the well qualified entering student. Itrecognizes his back-ground by encouraging him to complete the elementary material throughphysical chemistry as rapidly as possible so as to proceed to courses ofgreater content. The science and mathematics portions of this programand the semester hours credit for each are shown in the following table.University of ArkansasB. S. Chemistry' CurriculumFall Semester Spring Semester1st Year5 General Chemistry 4 Analytical Chemistry I5 Calculus I 5 Calculus II4 Biology 4 Biology2nd Year4 Organic Chemistry 5 Organic Chemistry4 Physics 4 Physics3 Calculus III3rd Year4 Physical Chemistry 6 Physical Chemistry4 Analytical Chemistry II4th Year2 Modern Organic Analysis Research3 Advanced Inorganic3 Elective Advanced Chemistry LectureResearchMinimum Total Hours:40 Chemistry136 All courses.While strongly believing that this course sequence is well designed toprepare the qualified student for graduate work or industrial employ-ment we also recognize that not all of the high schools are giving thislevel of preparation and alternative sequences are available whichbegin at a lower level but sacrifice flexibility in the final year to stillachieve the same coverage.Finally, it should be strongly emphasized that a simple list of suchcourses does not adequately reflect the greatest changes which aretaking place. These are changes in the content of the individual courses.In many cases while the titles employed are the classical titles, thecourses themselves bear little resemblance to those taught only tenyears ago. In this respect even the most current of textbooks are tooold for they are outdated before they see print and a great responsibilityresolves upon the teaching faculty for the rapid and effective incorpora-tion of current developments into the ever changing undergraduate cur-riculum.123Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 20 [1966], Art. 21https://scholarworks.uark.edu/jaas/vol20/iss1/21124Arkansas Academy of Science ProceedingsLITERATURE CITED1. Robert I. Walter, J. Chem. Ed. 42, 524-528 (1965).2. John Ross, J. Chem. Ed. 43, 112-115(1 966).3. Robert B. Whitney, J. Chem. Ed. 43, 116-117 (1966).4. Arthur E. Martell, J. Chem. Ed. 43, 117-120 (1966).124Journal of the Arkansas Academy of Science, Vol. 20 [1966], Art. 21Published by Arkansas Academy of Science, 1966

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Undergraduate Curriculum in Chemistry

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