Videos in Chemistry Education

Jessica Parr has been involved in instruction in General Chemistry since 1999. First serving as a peer instructor as an undergraduate student, working throughout graduate school as a teaching assistant in the laboratory space and discussion sections, she is now teaching faculty at the University of Southern California. She has worked with all levels of students, from the least prepared, who have never had any instruction in chemistry, to the most prepared, who have scored a five on their Advanced Placement exams. Jessica has also worked as a mentor for undergraduate students awarded research fellowships through the Women in Science and Engineering Program and has been recognized with university wide mentoring awards for her efforts. She is responsible for organizing professional development programming and speaker series to engage the students in research activities. In 2018 she was named a Dornsife Science Transformation Fellow to redesign the second semester general chemistry experience. Rather than the traditional lecture and lab model, students in the discovery course perform short experiments and hands-on activities every day in the laboratory space. The entire semester involves active learning and increased student engagement. She is also working to ease the transition between general and organic chemistry, with the ultimate goal being to better prepare students for all future classes in chemistry and improve retention of course material. Jessica is committed to making chemistry more accessible to everyone and to increasing science literacy.