Abstract

Many students enrolled in undergraduate genetics courses have difficulty relating concepts taught in class to real-world applications in agriculture. The objective of this study was to determine if incorporating a current events assignment improved student learning in an undergraduate genetics class. Students were either assigned no current events projects (fall 2012), five papers on any species (fall 2013), four papers with evenly distributed due dates on agricultural species (spring 2015), or a group video-based assignment on any species (fall 2016). Students took a pre- and post-test to measure improvement in knowledge during the semester. Students in all semesters exhibited improvement in knowledge, but there was no clear pattern of improvement due to incorporation of current events assignments. Even though this is an agricultural genetics class, students tended to choose articles based on humans, indicating lack of reading on their chosen subject of study. Although the result was not consistently reflected in objective measures of achievement, students perceived both paper and video assignments as moderately helpful in reinforcing course content. Students rated the video assignment as slightly more helpful than the papers, but this result may be because students also tended to rate the video assignment as highly enjoyable.