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The microbiology concept inventory can be used to access learning gains in many different ways. It's most common usage is as a pre- post-test of an entire course to determine where your students are learning, and where they are not. From this information, you can make adjustments to your instructional methods to address any shortcomings. The MCI can also serve to measure various teaching methods and determine what makes an impact and what doesn't.

If you are giving the MCI, you want to do a pre-test before any instruction. For large classes, using a survey site, such as Qualtrics is extremely useful. If you do use Qualtrics, here are two important gotchas I ran across while using it.

1. Make sure the each question has it's coded values correct. Qualtrics assigns a number to each response (1, 2, 3, …) These numbers are assigned based upon when you enter them. If you do this out of order or have to add or delete responses, the numbering will not be in order, and this can confuse your responses. Make sure you check each question after you are done entering the values to make sure A=1, B=2, C=3, and D=4. You can do this by choosing advanced options -> Recode values …
2. When you export your data for analysis, choose Download Data Table, and make sure the Use numeric values radio button is selected. Otherwise, you will get text responses.

After treatment, administer the MCI as a post-test. When you are finished, you can upload your results to this site and the analysis will be done for you.

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