To be able to design a laboratory course it is important to know what laboratory skills students possess before the course starts. This way the course can focus on developing skills in areas that are lacking. Despite the extensive literature on laboratory education, there are few studies on what laboratory skills students have at this stage of…

Currently, traditional paper methods may not effectively be used in education due to lack of access, outdated content, and poor graphics. Education through mobile-based applications is one of the alternative solutions. The objective of this study was to develop and evaluate LabSafety educational application and its effect on promoting the…

Samples of a composite hydrogel incorporating clay (Laponite XLG and S-482) nanoparticles were prepared using N-isopropylacrylamide. The hydrogels were formed via a radical-initiated addition polymerization using potassium persulfate and N,N,N',N'-tetramethylethylenediamine. Students then measured the force required to stretch the gels and…

The 2015 edition of the American Chemical Society's "Guidelines and Evaluation Procedures for Bachelor's Degree Programs" identifies six skill sets that undergraduate chemistry programs should instill in their students. In our roles as support staff for chemistry departments at two different institutions (one a Primarily Undergraduate…

Exothermic reactions can present safety hazards and there is a recognized need for reaction safety education at the undergraduate level. We present an experiment that illustrates the pitfall of direct scale-up of an exothermic reaction that can lead to thermal runaway. The iodide-catalyzed hydrogen peroxide decomposition reaction yields…

The university traditionally has been the foundation for young adults' professional development, yet the proclivity toward safety culture has garnered less focus in higher education than in the workforce. A survey of faculty at a medium-sized, research-active, private institution revealed specific areas of policy noncompliance as well as specific…

This article describes how the Sichuan University - Pittsburgh Institute has embraced new methods and new technologies to ensure high-quality laboratory teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic. Taking Mechanical Measurements 1 course as an example, this paper introduces two lab projects that were successfully transferred into online experiments…

This study investigates a novel approach to training first-year science faculty students in laboratory safety and ethical awareness. Students were exposed to videos of laboratory incidents via their smartphones. They had to respond to the scenarios by scanning QR codes transfixed on certain equipment or taking photos of the laboratory's…

Safety education is absent in the chemistry curriculum. This commentary discusses the consequences of the missing safety education for graduates and institutions that hire them. It suggests and discusses the application of the theory of Normalization of Deviance to explain why safety education is missing. It suggests ways to fix the shortcoming by…

The design and fabrication of functional scientific instrumentation allows students to forge a link between commonly reported numbers and physical material properties. Here, a two-point and four-point probe station for measuring electrical properties of solid materials is fabricated via 3D printing utilizing an inexpensive benchtop…

Activities carried out in the laboratory provide important contributions to students in terms of developing their research, problem solving, questioning, using hand skills and communication skills. However, providing safety during the studies in the laboratory environment is extremely important. The aim of this study is to determine information…

Virtual laboratory simulations are commercially available to train students; these creative resources are available to complete remotely without traditional time and safety restrictions of laboratory-based practical classes. We introduced a Health and Safety virtual laboratory simulation to a core large first-year science module. Having surveyed…

A 14 week undergraduate course on laboratory safety was developed at the University of Pittsburgh. The first segment of the course consists of a series of lectures intended to increase the students' knowledge and appreciation of safety. In the second segment, experts from both academia and industry present and discuss case studies on specialized…

This study is an attempt to identify the level of awareness of safety measures practiced in school laboratories among pre-service Science teachers at Najran University. It also aims to identify the sources of safety measures awareness and the statistically significant differences among the sample responses due to specialization and grade…

Chemical laboratory safety education is often synonymous with boring, dry, drawn-out lectures. In an effort to challenge this norm and stimulate vivid learning opportunities about laboratory safety, college chemistry classes analyzed a short, humorous video clip of a character, named Mr. Bean, who visits a chemistry laboratory and commits several…