Instructional development project: Five-semester report on an innovative introduction to Psychology course

Abstract

Statement of the Problem Undergraduate programs in psychology have become a national phenomenon. While general,enrollment trends in postsecondary education have shown a decrease, psychology programs have shewn enrollment stability and many have experienced enrollment increases. The May, 1974 issue of the APA Monitor, a journal of the American Psychological Association, cited the growth in graduate school enrollments as 12.5 percent. This, in turn, indicated a growth in the undergraduate programs that prepare students for Psychology-related jobs, for graduate programs in psychology, and for graduate programs in related fields. The same situation was true within the State University of New York (SUNY). All of the undergraduate psychology programs in SUNY have demonstrated enrollment stability and many have experienced increases. Furthermore, it should be noted that these increases represent both students majoring in psychology and nonmajors fulfilling other program requirements or taking elective courses. At the State University College at Oneonta, the Psychology Department experienced an "enrollment crush." While general enrollment demand has remained consistently strong, the introductory and basic courses realized an enrollment growth of 20 percent-and this does not fully represent the enrollment demand for these courses. Psychology 100 is the introductory course for majors and non-majors in the Psychology program at Oneonta. It was taught as a multiple-section, three-lectures-per-week course. And it was the primary source of a dilemma affecting the total operations of the department and the scope and depth of the entire Psychology program. There were six problems-academic and fiscal-associated with the Psychology 100 course. First and foremost was the "enrollment crush" affecting the discipline. Because the course was a typical multiple-section course, taught as lecture/discussion three times per week, the response to rising enrollment pressures had been to cautiously increase the size of the sections-regarded as a necessary evil. However, the department anticipated that sections would become so oversized that the academic quality of the course would be sacrificed. Preliminary plans were made for a course revision based on enrollment projections for the Fall of 1974. That enrollment projection was for 360 students to be taught in eight sections of 45 students each by four faculty members. (See Figure 1.) In the face of the "enrollment crush", this course actually served 515 students in the Fall of 1974-<1n unanticipated increase of more than 40 percent-taught in nine sections by five faculty members. (See Figure 2.) Note that four sections ballooned from 45 students to 75 students and that another section and faculty member were added to keep from "overloading" still more sections. Also. note that the Psychology Department was augmented by a temporary, part-time instructor to help rectify the faculty deployment problem. Second, the problem of accommodating increasing enrollments was compounded by the unavailability of funds to hire a corresponding number of new faculty. As with any institution that is coping with the "zero growth" phenomenon, (actual experience has been staff reduction) it is difficult to shift resources