Research projects conducted by faculty in STEM departments served as the inspiration for a new curriculum of inquiry-based, multiweek laboratory modules in the general chemistry 1 course. The purpose of this curriculum redesign was to improve students' attitudes about chemistry as well as their self-efficacy and skills in performing inquiry activities. Students' ability to plan experiments and interpret data improved throughout the semester, as did their confidence in conducting research-like lab activities. Improved confidence was observed among men and women, science and engineering students, and Caucasian and international students. These outcomes are similar to those found with authentic research-based experiments. The curriculum had less of an impact on students' attitudes about chemistry. A research-inspired curriculum offers many benefits to students without the difficulties of designing actual research-based projects for general chemistry classes.

Reliance upon multi-criteria decision methods, like ELECTRE III, has increased many folds in the past few years. However, ELECTRE III has not yet been applied in ranking universities. League tables are important because they may have an impact on the number and quality of the students. The tables serve an indication of prestige. This paper describes a three-tier Web-system, which produces a customised ranking of British Universities with ELECTRE III reflecting personal preferences, where information is uncertain and vague. Using this case study, the benefits of ELECTRE III in the ranking process are illustrated.

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This article assesses the variety of discourses articulated by journalists reporting on environmental issues. In particular, it investigates how environmental journalists perceive their role and function as reporters of environmental issues as well as the problems they face while reporting. The authors interviewed 23 newspaper reporters covering environmental issues for the nine largest (in terms of daily circulation) daily Greek newspapers, by employing Q-methodology, a qualitative statistical approach specially adjusted for small samples. The subsequent analysis reveals three "factors," or distinct discourses, labeled "scientifically objective, environmentally responsible journalist," "environmental crusaders," and "objective-pure journalists." By analyzing factors' discourses, the authors concluded that these groups are highly similar to the "disseminator," "interpreter/investigator," and "populist mobilize" categories identified in previous research for journalists with different field orientations. However, the last category ("adversarial") did not appear in our sample. The authors encourage the replication of