In the mid-1990s, two important trends in higher education coalesced at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The first was increased enrollments in undergraduate life science programs; the second, the implementation of introductory calculus reform projects. The result was the development of an innovative calculus course created to meet the specific needs of life science students. In this section of our case study, we briefly examine those trends and how they played out at UIUC, ultimately giving rise to the learning environment² featured here--BioCalc.

Increased Enrollments in Undergraduate Biology Programs
Between 1991 and 1997, undergraduate degree awards in the biological sciences at U.S. colleges and universities increased 49 percent (Snyder, 2000). The dramatic increase in enrollments has had serious impacts for biology departments, leading to larger class sizes, decreased student-faculty interaction, and strained resources.

In order to control enrollments in particular areas, colleges and universities frequently use gateway courses. These large, impersonal introductory courses are used to "weed out" certain students in what is typically viewed in academia as a process of natural selection. Such practices, though not officially acknowledged, are widespread, especially in SMET disciplines.³

At UIUC, enrollment in the School of Life Sciences⁴ in the early to mid-90s reflected national enrollment trends. Enrollments jumped dramatically, then slowly leveled off.⁵ Despite the burdens of higher enrollments, however, faculty and administrators with whom we spoke attested that the aim of the school was to retain its students, not send them packing.

"Weeding out is not a philosophy here," explained Susan Fahrbach, professor of entomology and faculty director of the Howard Hughes Program in Life Sciences. Instead, the school focuses many of its resources on creating programs and opportunities that help its students succeed. BioCalc is one such effort.

During our interviews, Jerry Uhl recounted to us how, in the early 1990s, Sandra Lazarowitz,⁶ at that time a faculty member in UIUC's Department of Microbiology and director of the Howard Hughes Program, grew concerned over the struggle many life science students were having not with their entry-level biology courses, but with the introductory calculus courses that are prerequisite to earning a degree in Life Sciences at UIUC (Table 1). In particular, Uhl recalled, she was alarmed to find that nearly sixty percent of life science students were receiving grades of C or lower.⁷ After speaking to biology faculty with similar concerns, Lazarowitz decided to take up the issue with the math department. Someone there gave her Uhl's name.

Calculus Reform
In the 1980s, there was a growing concern in higher education that calculus, as it was currently being taught, was not serving the needs of its students.⁸ Failure rates in typical, lecture-based calculus courses were sometimes as high as fifty percent. Students who did pass were able to do the calculations (i.e., "plug and chug") but often seemed to lack a clear understanding of the concepts behind the work. The calculus reform movement, as it became known, aimed to help students learn not just calculations but concepts and applications, as well.

The National Science Foundation began funding calculus reform projects in 1988. One of the first projects funded was at UIUC, where Uhl and two math colleagues, Horacio Porta (also at UIUC) and Bill Davis (at Ohio State University), were developing a computer-based calculus course. Looking for a way to improve student learning, they had come across Mathematica, a technical computing system that combined the ability to perform calculations (both numeric and symbolic) with strong visual and text capabilities. Uhl was intrigued less by the program's computing capabilities than by its ability to "mix texts with commands," a feature that he saw as a potentially powerful learning tool.

Converging Trends at UIUC
By the time Professor Lazarowitz contacted him, Uhl had successfully implemented a number of courses using the Calculus&Mathematica (C&M) courseware (see Table 2 for C&M courses offered at UIUC). These courses, however, had been developed primarily for engineering students.

"I don't know where she got my name," Jerry recalled, "but she called me and said, 'Do you have anything to offer?'"

I said, "We have a course that we've developed--for engineers--but it just so happens that many of the activities in this course use life science models." After all, the derivative measures growth, and what grows? Populations, animals, etc. So I told her we had a course that we could pitch at life science students without really making any significant changes in the course itself.

In fact, very few modifications were needed to get this new course going. BioCalc, as it came to be known, was first offered to life science students in the fall of 1994. Though the content was introductory calculus, the examples and applications were drawn from the life sciences.

Course Number	Course Title
Math 120	Calculus I
Math 130	Calculus II
Math 135	Calculus I (Alternate sequence)
Math 225	Introductory Matrix Theory
Math 242	Calculus III
Math 245	Calculus II (Alternate sequence)
Math 285	Differential Equations
Math 315	Linear Algebra
Math 361	Probability and Statistics

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