data on typical FCI scores

[Ben Crowell <bcrowell@SPRINTMAIL.COM>]

I wrote:
> I have started administering the FCI to my students........ but I'm
> also not sure how to interpret the numbers, since I don't have much
> to compare with ..... Would anyone be interested in contributing
> data?  I've created a form, below, but let's wait until Jan. 1 for
> comments before anyone starts sending me data.  It might turn out
> that similar data are already available.

Richard Hake wrote:
> Ben and other Phys-L'ers may be unaware of my survey(1-3) of FCI(4)
> and Mechanics Diagnostic(5) pre/post data for 62 introductory physics
> courses enrolling a total number of students N = 6542.

Oops! My fault for not doing sufficient research into what data
had already been compiled. Also, I guess a lot of Phys-L folks,
including Richard, must have been tuned out for the holidays
when I asked for comments on the survey idea.
In any case, my request for data only resulted in four reports,
two of which were my own :-/

After reading Richard's publications
(<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake>)
I am still interested in the possibility of collecting further data
and/or mining the data that already exists, but maybe I should
shut up for a while and try to live down my original ill-
conceived foray. (I can't help thinking it would be interesting
to know, e.g., which of the data-points in Richard's papers were from
algebra-based courses and which were from engineering physics courses.
Also, so many of the community college data-points were from a single
school using Paul D'Alessandris's techniques that I would be very
interested in seeing more CC data. And if there are many other
people like me who don't want to do pretesting, maybe it would
be helpful to have statistics on raw scores rather then g's.)

Finally, since a sub-thread seems to have developed on the merits
of the FCI itself, I can't resist putting in my own two cents' worth --
C'mon folks, let's not try to pretend it's OK when our students
take the FCI and say they think a heavy ball bearing dropped from the
roof of a single-story building will get to the ground more quickly
than a light ball bearing <:-(

 Ben Crowell
 Fullerton College