The Raker Research Group is composed of chemical education scholars focused on developing tools to assess learning and to evaluate learning experiences in undergraduate chemistry courses. We use a variety of quantitative and qualitative methods to achieve our research goals including survey research methods, structural equation modeling, psychometric evaluations of validity and reliability, semi-structured interviews, focus groups, think-aloud protocols, and response process interviews.
🚨 New Research from the Raker Research Group 🚨
ABSTRACT: "A deep understanding of organic chemistry requires a learner to understand many concepts and have fluency with multiple skills. This understanding is particularly necessary for constructing and using mechanisms to explain chemical reactions. Electrophilicity and nucleophilicity are two fundamental concepts to learning and understanding reaction mechanisms. Prior research suggests that learners focus heavily on explicit structural features (e.g., formal charge) rather than implicit features (e.g., an open p-orbital) when identifying and describing the role of electrophiles and nucleophiles in reaction mechanisms; however, these findings come from small-scale, interview-based investigations with a limited number of reaction mechanisms. The work reported herein seeks to further explore the meaning learners ascribe to electrophiles and nucleophiles by evaluating 19,936 written explanations from constructed-response items asking what is happening in reaction mechanisms and why it happens for 85 unique reaction mechanisms across a yearlong postsecondary organic chemistry course. To analyze these data, we developed an electrophile rubric to capture learners’ level of explanation sophistication (Absent, Descriptive, Foundational, and Complex); this electrophile rubric is complementary to a nucleophile rubric previously reported in the literature. Our data show proportional levels of explanation sophistication for electrophiles and nucleophiles (τb = 0.402) across these written explanations of reaction mechanisms. We note that learners’ explanations of nucleophiles tend to be at a higher level than their explanations of electrophiles. While this finding does support prior literature reports, we also found that explanations of mechanisms involving reductions of pi-bonds (e.g., carbonyls) tended to be more sophisticated for electrophiles than for nucleophiles. Overall, our results support the claim that learners are able to discuss both electrophilicity and nucleophilicity; however, learners discuss electrophilicity and nucleophilicity at different levels of sophistication where nucleophilicity predominates for most reaction types."
Posted on February 2, 2023
Congratulations to Stephanie Front for successfully completing their Candidacy Defense!
Posted on January 31, 2023
🚨 New Research from the Raker Research Group 🚨
Some takeways:
There is no one-size-fits-all solution to instructional change; malleable factors can inform different change strategies based on the desired outcome.
Posted on November 21, 2022
Congratulations to Dr. Brandon J. Yik for successfully defending their dissertation today! Dr. Yik is the fourth student to graduate a Ph.D. from the Raker Research Group.
Posted on October 4, 2022
Congratulations to Dr. Aaron M. Clark for successfully completing their doctoral degree requirements! Dr. Clark is the third student to graduate with a Ph.D. from the Raker Research Group.
Posted on July 22, 2021
A warm welcome to Dr. Megan Connor who has joined the Raker Research Group as a postdoctoral researcher! Dr. Connor will be working on several of our NSF funded research initiatives!!!
Posted on June 1, 2021
Jeff (he/him/his) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Chemistry at the University of South Florida, having joined the faculty as an Assistant Professor in 2013. Jeff concurrently serves as the Associate Director of the ACS Examinations Institute.
He received his undergraduate degree in chemistry at Ohio Northern University (Ada, Ohio) in 2003, and a Master of Arts degree in college student personnel at Bowling Green State University (Bowling Green, Ohio) in 2005. Jeff obtained a Ph.D. in chemistry from Purdue University (West Lafayette, Indiana) in 2011 working with Professor Marcy Towns.
He was a postdoctoral research associate with the ACS Examinations Institute (hosted by Iowa State University at the time) from 2011 to 2013 with Professor Thomas Holme.
Jeff has authored and collaborated on over 65 peer-reviewed publications (Google Scholar), contributed chapters to revised editions of the ACS Exams General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry Study Guides, given over 20 invited seminars and research talks, and contributed to over 100 conference talks, papers, and posters.
Jeff is a queer/gay chemist, proud uncle/guncle, Disney enthusiast, amateur baker and chef, and bow tie maker.
Postdoctoral Research Associate
Ph.D., 2021, Chemistry, University of Michigan
B.S., 2016, Chemistry, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill
Joined: Summer 2021
Doctoral Candidate
B.S., 2021, Chemistry and French, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Joined: Fall 2021
Graduate Student
B.S., 2022, Chemistry, Florida State University
Joined: Fall 2022
Graduate Student
B.S., 2022, Chemistry (ACS Certified) and Secondary Education, Appalachian State University
Joined: Fall 2022
Ph.D., Chemical Education
Dissertation Defense: June 12, 2018
Currently: Assistant Director of Assessment, University of South Florida
Ph.D., Chemical Education
Dissertation Defense: February 26, 2020
Currently: Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Michigan
Ph.D., Chemical Education
Dissertation Defense: January 28, 2021
Currently: Lecturer, Yale University
Ph.D., Chemical Education
Dissertation Defense: October 4, 2022
Currently: Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Virginia
ACS Exams, 2015-2016
Currently: Faculty, California State University - Fullerton
2016-2017
Currently: Data Analyst, Muma College of Business, University of South Florida
ACS Exams, 2017-2018
Currently: Faculty, Metropolitan State University of Denver
2019-2020
Currently: Faculty, University of Rhode Island
M.A., Chemical Education
Graduated: Summer 2016
M.A., Chemical Education
Graduated: Summer 2018
Honors Thesis
Major: Secondary Mathematics Education
Graduated: Spring 2015
Major: Microbiology
Graduated: Spring 2015
Major: Biology
Graduated: Summer 2015
Major: Integrative Animal Biology
Graduated: Fall 2016
Major: Health Science
Graduated: Spring 2017
Major: Biomedical Sciences
Graduated: Spring 2017
Honors Thesis
Major: Cell and Molecular Biology
Graduated: Spring 2018
Major: Cell and Molecular Biology
Graduated: Spring 2018
For the most up-to-date listing of publications from the Raker Research Group, please visit Dr. Raker's Google Scholar Page.