Equipment: Chabot College NMR Spectrometer

With support from the Improving Undergraduate STEM Education: Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI Program), this Educational Instrumentation project at Chabot College will strengthen undergraduate learning in multiple disciplines. Specifically, this project will secure a Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectrometer, which will allow students to gain hands-on experience as they develop skills in organic chemistry laboratory courses. An estimated 160 students enrolled in the institution’s Biology, Chemistry, or Engineering associate degrees programs will utilize the project-funded equipment each year. In addition to providing improved experiences in courses, the new equipment will also be used by the student Chemistry Club and as part of the institutional K-12 STEM day.

The goals of this project are to enrich the learning and experiences of undergraduate students by upgrading critical instruments. Current NMR equipment at the institution is reaching the end of its useful life span, leading to inconsistent results and limiting opportunities for direct student use. The new instrument will allow a larger number of students to develop basic NMR spectrometer lab skills and will include Carbon-13 NMR functionality that is not currently available at the institution. The project will assess the impact of the project funded equipment using surveys, course enrollment patterns, and an examination of course-level student learning outcomes. This project is funded by the HSI Program, which aims to enhance undergraduate STEM education and increase capacity to engage in the development and implementation of innovations to improve STEM teaching and learning at HSIs.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

Award Number: 2524513
Principal Investigator: Wayne Pitcher
Funds Obligated: $200,000
State: CA